


Patrick and Smith, Part 2

by reverseblackholeofwords, RubberSoles19



Series: Devil May Care [2]
Category: Five Nights at Freddy's, MatPat - Fandom, NateWantsToBattle - Fandom, Supernatural, Youtubers
Genre: FNAF!AU, FNaF is canon, Five Nights at Freddy's 1, Gen, Step-brothers!AU, au!, fnaf - Freeform, more angst!, stuff gets real good this episode, supernatural!AU, you don't have to know the show to follow the series!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-18
Updated: 2020-04-03
Packaged: 2021-02-28 18:27:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 23,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23191639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reverseblackholeofwords/pseuds/reverseblackholeofwords, https://archiveofourown.org/users/RubberSoles19/pseuds/RubberSoles19
Summary: In the spring of 1995, tragedy struck Freddy Fazbear's Pizza, a local restaurant chain, claiming the lives of five children, and changing the lives of two young boys, Nathan Smith and Matthew Patrick, forever. Nearly 20 years later, the two step-brothers are brought back together through the reappearance of an old fiend, but this time, it's their own lives that are on the line.FNaF, Step-brothers, and Supernatural!AUStory co-written by Rubbersoles19 and ReverseBlackHoleofWords. Script by Rubbersoles19, Narrative by ReverseBlackHoleofWords. Cover art by Rubbersoles19.
Relationships: Matthew Patrick & Nathan Sharp, Matthew Patrick/Stephanie Patrick, Nathan Sharp & Jonathan Indovino, Nathan Sharp & Stephanie Patrick, Stephanie Patrick & Jonathan Indovino
Series: Devil May Care [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1646251
Comments: 149
Kudos: 62





	1. Introduction

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome back for round 2! Sorry, Part 2. Part 2...
> 
> In light of how the whole world is currently losing its mind, Reverse and myself might be adjusting our upload schedule a little to help keep you crazy kids occupied. Heaven knows we've got enough written ahead of time. So stay posted for that.
> 
> Also, we have a blog now!  
> devil-may-care-series.tumblr.com  
> Come check it out for fun memes, inspiration, AMAs, and maybe some special treats.
> 
> Thanks all!  
> \- Becca

Medina, Ohio  
June 1998  
  


Matthew’s bedroom was chock full of every nerdy thing his heart could desire. Posters of exotic animals, a bedspread and matching curtains with particles spinning in artistic motion, and even a lime green lava lamp on the nightstand next to his bed. He wore a pair of pajamas that mapped the constellations, sitting there with his back leaned against a large pillow and a book in his lap.

Nathan Smith, on the other hand, slipped back into the room in a large t-shirt and gym shorts that hung down over his band-aid taped knees. His hair was all askew, still damp from having just washed it rather sloppily, and he sprinted across the room and dove, knees-first into the air mattress set up for him beneath the bedroom window.

“Stop! You’ll bust it!” Matthew kept his place in his book with one finger and leaned down to look at the scrawny kid. “If you do that, you’ll be sleeping on the floor!”

But Nate only sneered up at him, childlike insolence incarnate. “I’m already sleeping on the floor, dummy!”

Sullen about sharing his room for the night, the newness of his “little brother” wearing off quickly, Matthew went back to reading his book. “Well, that’s not my fault, is it?”

In a show of obvious irritation, Nate burrowed under the blankets laid across the air mattress and, huffing, plopped his head onto his pillow. As Matthew continued to read, Nate grew restless, flopping from one side to the other until he finally stood and stomped over to the light switch. A long, annoyed look at Matthew yielded no results - he had his nose buried in that dumb book, too oblivious to notice Nate’s poisonous stare - so he switched the light off.

“Hey, I’m still reading!”

Nate opened his mouth as if to reply, but instead of retorting with one of his usual middle-schooler insults, his eyes seemed transfixed on Matthew’s lava lamp. The green glow travelled up the nearest wall to the ceiling and spilled over the floor around the nightstand as amorphous blobs floated up in what seemed to Nate like magic. Matt’s gaze followed Nate’s to the lamp, and he rolled his eyes. Then setting his book down on the nightstand, he jumped out of bed and pushed Nate back a step to turn the lights on again.

“Hey! Stop!” Nate reached for the light switch again, but Matthew, a whole head and shoulders taller than him, covered it with both his hands and used one leg to push Nate back from it. “Turn it off!”

“Not until I’m done with my book!” Matt gave one final shove backwards with his foot, but Nate came back at him with much more force. Both hands outstretched, he shoved Matthew back into the wall, knocking down a hanging wall calendar that hit the ground with a loud thump.

Both boys seemed shocked, and Nate could feel in the pit of his stomach that he’d messed up. When a knock pounded on the door, both boys jumped in shock, but Nate ran back to the air mattress just as John opened the door. “What’s going on in here?”

Nate looked to Matthew and Matthew looked to Nate as if neither of them could agree on who should have to explain the situation, but fortunately, Mary arrived in time to save them both from the fire. “Is everyone alright? We thought we heard shouting.”

Matt crossed the room back to his bed and sat down on the edge of it, casting a loathful glance at Nate. “Yeah, we’re fine.” He settled back into his reading position once he plucked his book from the place he’d left it. Nate stared daggers back at him and the book.

Mary didn’t have to read minds to realize what was going on between them. Neither of them were used to this new living arrangement, and it would take some adjusting on both their parts. But nothing in the world is more stubborn and more hard-headed than a young boy.

“Matthew, darling, bed time, okay?” She watched her son grumble to himself, slap his bookmark in place, and set his book aside for the night. “Goodnight, Matty,” she whispered over him as she pulled the covers up to his chin and kissed his forehead.

“Goodnight,” he murmured back and then, “Mom?” Matthew reached up to take the sleeve of Mary’s nightgown and pull her closer to him as he whispered, “How much longer are they going to stay here?”

Both Mary and John’s faces flashed with sudden emotion as Nate curled into an even smaller lump beneath the blankets on the air mattress. Mary brushed a hand over Matt’s hair and pressed another kiss to his cheek. “You’ll get used to it.” Matt’s nose wrinkled as she drew back, standing over him and looking conflicted. She knew it was a lot to ask of any child, to give up what had always been theirs for what amounted to total strangers, but she was convinced, this was for the best. “Goodnight, boys. We’ll be right down the hall if you need anything.”

She turned to John then, maybe hoping that he would say something, but instead he turned and left for bed. Mary switched the lights off, lingered just a moment more, and then shut the door quietly behind her. The room was silent for a long while, both boys staring up at the ceiling and fuming.

* * *

Later in the night, Matt was awoken by a sharp gasp. He rubbed his eyes and glanced around, unsure of where the noise might’ve come from until he remembered. Yes, there was an intruder in his room, and a rather annoying one at that. He decided to roll over in an attempt to go back to sleep, until he heard the whispering coming from behind his back. Matt frowned and rolled back to his other side. With the glow of the lava lamp he could see Nate’s face, twisted in concentration and anger, as he stared at the far corner of Matt’s room.

Slowly, Matt turned his head to see what it was, but the corner was empty, nothing more than a few shadows and a stack of books. He glanced back at Nate. The kid was still glaring hatefully into the corner and muttering something under his breath. Suddenly he flinched back as if struck by something, and the movement was so violent and quick that Matt himself jumped, sitting up. Nate, seeming to remember at that moment that Matt was there, stared up at him on the bed as Matthew looked back to the corner as if he could’ve missed what Nate was seeing the first time.

Still nothing.

Matt climbed out of bed reluctantly, tip-toed across the floor, and switched on the lights once again. Nothing changed. No monster in the corner or under the bed or anything. Nate sat stock-still on the partially deflated air mattress, and Matt frowned at him. “What’s wrong with you?”

“Nothing, you mouth-breather!” Nate growled defensively. “What’s wrong with you? You scared of the dark or something?”

Matthew rolled his eyes. “No, I’m not.”

“Well, I’m not either!” Nate dropped his head back onto his pillow, covering up and turning away from Matthew so that this conversation would end already.

“Fine.” Matt turned off the lights again, got back in his bed, and muttered, “Just stop talking to your imaginary friend and go to sleep!”

“I _was_ asleep,” the lump on the air mattress replied.

“Well then, go back to sleep!” He couldn’t believe this, couldn’t believe that his mother would bring these two people into their house, force Matthew to share a room with some kid who was seeing things. Meanwhile, the sounds of wiggling and tossing and squeaking rubber filled the room from the general direction of the air mattress. “Oh, would you quite moving around?”

Nate huffed and kicked off his blankets. “Maybe if I had a big, comfy bed like yours, I would!”

“It’s not my fault you’re bums and had to move in with me and my mom, so you get the air mattress.” Matt was hissing with anger by then, a kettle boiling over as he gripped his sheets tight. “Besides, I told you not to bust it and you did. You made the bed, lie in it!”

“Shut up.”

Matthew rolled his eyes up at the ceiling, a gesture lost on the annoying little boy to his right. “Wow, coming from the kid whose worst insult is ‘mouth breather’ that really hurts. What’s next, calling me ‘snot breath’? ‘Booger brains’?”

Rather than coming back with another insult, Nate suddenly scrambled up to his feet and backed into the corner, his eyes wide as he stared once again at the empty corner across the room. “Stop it! Stop staring at him like that!”

Matt sprang up with new fear, slapped the light switch, and rushed back to Nate’s side, checking the whole room as he moved. Nate chewed at his fingernails, tugged at his oversized clothes, but still Matt couldn’t see anything that should send the kid into such a panic. Matthew sighed.

Crossing the room again, he went to his nightstand and turned off the lava lamp. He crawled under his desk to unplug it, careful not to touch the hot parts as he lifted and carried it back to Nate’s corner of the room. He set it on the floor between the bed and the air mattress before plugging it in again and turning it on.

“What are you doing?” Nate asked, somehow accusatory even as he shrank in on himself at every movement that Matt made.

“It’s too bright where it was, so I’m moving it.” He cast a glare back at Nate. “You got a problem with it?”

Nate fidgeted with the giant AC/DC shirt, still unwilling to lay back down. “If it’s bothering you, why don’t you just turn it off?”

Matt shrugged and turned the lights off one more time. “It’s just new, haven’t gotten used to it yet.” Finally, he settled back into bed. “Now go to sleep, would ya?”

Nodding, Nate crawled back onto the air mattress and laid down beneath his blankets while keeping an eye on the little girl with tangled, dark hair staring at him from the corner, her face cast in the green glow of the lamp. Nate pulled his pillow to his chest, wrapping his small body around it, and rolled over to watch the lava lamp instead. Slowly, his eyes drifted shut, and he finally fell asleep.


	2. Answers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Surprise! Reverse and I have officially decided to up our upload schedule to three times a week since the whole world is shut down. We'll be uploading on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, at least until all this craziness lets up a little? Who knows.
> 
> Once again because this is backdated I'll be posting a link (or few) to each of the kids so you can be sure to have the right images of them in your brain, like we do so enjoy doing when writing.
> 
> But in the meantime, enjoy!
> 
> \- Becca

[[Nate](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IP_w8f-YnhI)] [[Matt and Steph](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I2nWlXPexP0&list=PLJq85sLoDiQ9FsmiZf4XSwQYFzQuNOFP3&index=5)] [[Jonathan](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_7XzP1p9tw)]

Los Angeles, California  
13 Years Later

Nate shifted, waking from a fitful sleep, and pried his eyes open. Reaching instinctively for a knife beneath his pillow, he found it wasn’t there. In fact, he didn’t recognize where he was at all. The little den with the curtains drawn to block the light, with soft furniture and embroidered pillows that left an impression on the skin of his cheek. He bolted upright only to clutch at his head, the pain overwhelming him in a sudden darkness before the world came slowly back to him.

His backpack laid on the floor beside him, and he fished around for a pistol before staggering down the unfamiliar hallway, following the sounds coming from around the corner. Two voices, speaking in hushed tones, the clacking of laptop keys, the clink of glass mugs on the countertop - it all seemed louder, sharper - he winced. But he hurried, and rounding the corner, he saw Stephanie and Jonathan huddled near a laptop together. They looked up as he entered.

Jonathan eyed the gun in particular. “What do you plan on doing with that, Smith?”

“You’re awake!” Stephanie came around the counter to see him, and if she noticed the gun, she pretended not to. “How are you feeling? Do you want some tea?”

Nate’s swollen eyes moved past her and back to Jonathan. “What’re you doing here?” He hadn’t yet relaxed his grip on the gun, and he couldn’t convince himself to either. Waking up in a different place than he passed out in, after seeing a vision of his dying brother no less, was always a treat for his nerves.

Jonathan sipped the tea from his mug, as nonchalantly as he could manage, and tipped it towards Steph. “She called me. Said you’d collapsed on the side of the road. Figured that warranted a little day trip.” What he didn’t say - what his eyes said for him - was that he came to make sure Stephanie wasn’t alone with Nate, so that if anything were to go wrong…

“Here, take some of these.” Stephanie had somehow materialized a bottle of pills in one hand and a glass of water in the other. Or maybe she had simply walked away to go get them, Nate felt like his senses were not at their best in the present moment. “And sit down already. You look like you’re going to fall over.”

He felt like it, too, so he staggered over to one of the stools lining the kitchen island, set the gun down on the counter, and checked his pockets for his missing phone. “Crap, what time is it?”

“Medicine,” Stephanie reminded him as she unplugged his phone from the wall and handed it to him. Then she proceeded to pick up the gun between her first finger and her thumb like she expected it to bite her. She deposited it into a chair in the den which seemed safer somehow. She could abide a lot of things, but loaded guns on her kitchen counter was just too much.

When she returned, Nate had uncapped the bottle and was shaking the pills into his hand. “You always keep the good stuff on hand?”

Steph brushed her hands together and went back to her tea. “I’m a pharmacist. Just take the medicine already.” He did without any protest, and Stephanie could take some relief in that, at least. She wasn’t… whatever Nate and Jonathan were, but she could help in her own ways.

Jonathan cleared his throat. “So, uh, Nate, what happened back there?”

But Nate’s eyes widened in shock as he finally got his phone to turn on and checked the time. “I’ve been out for five hours? And you didn’t wake me up? What exactly have you two been doing all this time?”

“Uh, making sure you didn’t die. You’re welcome.” Stephanie set her mug down a little harder than necessary.

“And what about Matt?” Nate snapped at her, his patience eaten away by the idea that he’d been sleeping while Matthew was actively dying. “Have you done anything to find him?”

“What were we supposed to do, exactly?” Steph felt backed into a corner. There wasn’t much she could do at this point, not with Nate the way that he was on that road, not with him staring at nothing, lips going blue because he was too terrified to even take a breath. “You didn’t see yourself out there. I thought-”

“You have Matt’s Murder Wall!” Nate knew that he was yelling and knew that he shouldn’t be. His anger at Stephanie was misdirected and irrational, and still his brain couldn’t get his mouth to shut up. “Why didn’t you look through that for more clues?”

“We did!” Jonathan tried to reassure him and interjected himself - metaphorically and physically - into the conversation before Nate jumped across the island, with Steph as his only target.

“And?”

“And we didn’t find anything,” Jonathan admitted.

Nate stood, agitation making his teeth grit so tight they hurt. “Then you didn’t look hard enough! There has to be something. Matt had to have told us where he was going somehow! We don’t have time to just sit around so you two can flirt!”

“Excuse me?” Stephanie growled, and maybe she was going to be the one to jump the kitchen island.

“Whoa, dude! Calm down!” Jonathan was sick of defusing this particular ticking time bomb. If they were ever going to get anything done, Nate was going to have to stop picking fights every time he turned around. “What’s going on with you?”

“What’s up with me? What’s up with both of you? Matt is-” Nate sagged against the counter suddenly, his energy all spent and his face going pale once again as he barely managed to catch himself before becoming a puddle on the floor. He looked like he wanted to gag, reaching for the glass of water and nearly knocking it over with his shaking hands.

Stephanie felt chills on her arms and wrapped them around herself. “Matt is… what?”

He tried to think his way out of answering her, but his head was stuffed full of cotton balls and dead kids. And there was no way of getting out of this one. He swallowed more water and cleared his throat so it wasn’t so harsh before softly continuing. “Matt’s dying. Afton is killing him. I don’t know how long he has left.”

Steph gasped, and Jonathan leaned closer. “What?”

“How do you know?” Stephanie choked.

Nate worked his way back onto the stool he’d been sitting in a moment ago and screwed his eyes shut. “Because I saw him. On the road, I saw Matt as a hallucination.”

Stephanie, overwhelmed and on the verge of a complete mental collapse, stepped away from them for a moment with her hands twisting nervously together. Jonathan grabbed for Nate’s shoulder, to comfort him or get him to look at him, anything. But Nate just shifted away.

“You don’t know what that means,” Jonathan told him. “It could mean anything. It could mean nothing, right? I mean, you - you’re just stressed.”

“No, it means Afton is killing him. Just like he killed those kids.” Nate rubbed his hand over his face as he tried, desperately, to remember everything about what he had seen, the bruises and cuts on Matt’s wrists, the ooze coming from his mouth and nose, those words he tried to whisper to him.

“But how do you know that?”

Nate looked up at Stephanie, held her gaze for a moment, and looked down at his phone again. He tried to ignore how the shaking in his voice matched the shaking of his hands. “My entire life I've been having hallucinations of Afton's victims, all the kids he's ever killed as he killed them. Then I saw Matt-" Nate took a deep breath, feeling his lungs start to get tight. “I saw Matt on the road, and that means...”

Stephanie covered her mouth with her hands. “Oh my God.”

Nate twisted at the end of his t-shirt, threading the hem through his fingers as he spoke. “I could manage them. I was fine; Dad was training me to keep them hidden. But then about a month ago, right around the time Matt started acting weird,” he said, stealing a glance at Stephanie, “everything that I was already hallucinating got dialed up to a hundred.”

He took another drink from the glass of water, leaning his forehead into one of his hands. “I was seeing things whether I was awake or asleep, screaming, burning, hearing things, more of them all the time, almost constantly... but I never thought it meant he was back. Kind of just assumed I was actually going crazy.” He smiled, or grimaced, down at the countertop as Stephanie and Jonathan stood in silence watching him.

Finally, Steph cleared her throat. “What does this all mean?”

Nate turned his head to look at her, dropping his hands into his lap and curling his shoulders forward in a half-shrug. “It means, for whatever reason, I can see Afton’s victims. If I saw Matt, then Afton’s killing him, too. But it’s - different. He talked to me. They’ve never talked to me before. I don’t even know if any of them know who I am.”

“He talked to you? What did he say?” She leaned on the other side of the island with too much hope in her eyes for what Nate was telling her. Maybe she didn’t believe him. Maybe she would just rather cling to the fact that Matt spoke to Nate rather than deal with the implications. Either way, Nate didn’t want to let her down.

“He said ‘locks’ and then something like ‘why’? Or ‘wife,’ maybe ‘white’? I’m not sure what the second word was.” He looked between the two of them, who were watching him eagerly. “But you two went through his research, right? Does that mean anything?”

Jonathan only shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

“Well, maybe I’m ‘wife,’ right? And he wants you to find me,” Stephanie offered, but even she didn’t sound that convinced. Matt had already told her in the voicemail to find Nathan. If he could only manage just two words between such a temporary connection, he wouldn’t waste them. That wasn’t like her Matthew. “Well, we don’t have much else. What could ‘locks’ even mean? He’s locked up somewhere?”

“I might have something we could use.” Jonathan pushed his laptop further towards the center of the island so that they could all see the screen and unplugged his headphones from it. “I was going through that voicemail like you guys asked me too, and I think I isolated whatever you were hearing, Nate.”

He hit play and turned the volume up for them. In the background, underneath Matt’s words, metal screeching and snapping resounded like a horrible symphony. Clicking and clanking together, until it formed a sound so distinct, so familiar, that Nate stumbled back from the island and toppled his stool. Images flooded his mind, and he winced, grabbing his head again. The animatronics suits, oozing blood from their oddly human eyes and their oversized mouths, children screaming from somewhere deep beneath all the plastic and the gears and the spring locks.

“Nate?” Jonathan called, somewhere far away. The noises stopped suddenly.

Nate wheezed. “I know those sounds.” He pressed his fingers into his temples as his head started to clear again. “I know what those are.”

Steph chewed her lip and clutched the edge of the countertop. “What?”

“Freddy’s old Animatronic suits, the - the spring lock mechanisms that held them together. But why would…” Frowning, Nate looked up at the others just as they reached the same realization he had.

“Locks,” Jonathan whispered.

Stephanie clutched her hands together again until they shook. “The spring locks. Matt must have been trying to tell you something about the old suits, right?” But what did that have to do with him? What did that have to do with where Matthew was?

A familiar flicker in the corner of his vision drew Nate’s attention to one corner of the room. To her, the ever-present little girl with the striped shirt, he asked, “But why would Afton go after the suits? They’re just…” Then, he nearly tripped backwards as she stepped closer. “Whoa, whoa, whoa!”

Jonathan caught the sleeve of Nate’s shirt. “Smith? Nate?”

Nate motioned for Steph and Jonathan to step back, and they moved carefully behind him as the little girl strode forward, holding out her clenched fists to Nate and turning them over so that he could see her arms. She’d drawn her sleeves back to reveal the impressions in her skin, the puncture wounds ringed in bruises.

Nate knelt in front of her. “Oh God…” She looked at him expectantly as the others badgered him with questions somewhere behind his head. “That’s how he did it. Afton - how he kept them around, trapped until he was done with them. Sealing up the employee back rooms didn’t stop the murders because he had stopped using them. He found a better way.”

The little girl smiled at him, almost proud, as Nate turned his head back to Stephanie and Jonathan. “He put them in the suits.”

* * *

William Afton was meticulous in his work, loyal to his pattern, and though Matthew could not see the sun or anything else that might tell him the time of day, he could keep time by Afton’s strict schedule. The day started with loud, clanging metallic noises that drifted to Matt through the thin walls of this strange place. Wrenching, tearing, until slowly he dismantled a little more of the animatronics each day.

Matthew knew this because they would visit him, the animatronics, especially the one with the silver eyes - Freddy. And each day, a little more of them had been torn away. It was like Afton was searching for something, testing each piece and part of the walking nightmares, but he kept them functional, just so they could walk around, be his guard dogs, if Matthew had to guess.

He was fed each day when the animatronics left, just enough to keep him alive but never enough to stop the aching in his stomach. By the fourth or fifth day, Matthew started to feel as though he were Afton’s pet. The door would open, one of the animatronics would untie him, shove a bowl of nearly inedible food into his hands, and then leave, locking the door behind them. Matthew only attempted to use this as a chance to escape once. Afterwards, the welt on his head and the throbbing of his wrist reminded him how helpless he truly was.

After his meal, Afton would return, and this was the part of the day that Matthew had come to dread most. Because William Afton was meticulous. He had a pattern, and he kept to it. And he was very, very good at slowly but effectively chipping away at Matthew’s mind. It always started in his childhood home, Mary baking in the kitchen, John on the road again, Nate on the couch playing video games. This was the place where Matt felt safest.

And that’s why Afton turned it into his personal hell.

Trapped in his bedroom, knowing that his mother and little brother were somewhere beyond his door, Matthew could hear the animatronics - in the hallway, under his bed, in his closet. They were everywhere, and they were coming for him. Matthew tried to escape, tried to defend himself, and when neither of those worked, he would try to hide. It always ended with Mary and Nate screaming for him, Matthew pressing his hands over his ears as he hid.

Then it was his college dorm room, his first crappy apartment, his new home with Stephanie. New players would enter the game, but they all met the same fate, as Matthew learned over and over that he could not escape. He could not fight. He could only hide and pray and hope the nightmare would end soon. But the end of his nightmare never brought relief.

When Matthew was at his weakest, then Afton would feed. It felt like being strangled, like someone was reaching down his throat, grabbing his soul and tearing it from his chest, a little at a time. A little more was worn away day by day. Each time he felt a little colder, his breathing more labored, his head fuzzier, his memories so distant and foreign to him. His sanity felt like a thread about to snap.

But he realized that trying to hold onto everything would be too much. He had to focus his efforts, keep just one face, one memory, one strand of hope, and he chose her. Long brown hair, the bouquet of sunflowers and Queen Anne’s lace, a smile that stopped his whole world in its tracks. As long as he could remember the color of her eyes, the sound of her laugh, her favorite blend of tea - Afton might be meticulous, but Matthew was, too.


	3. The Truth is Out There

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not to be ominous, but... prepare yourselves. ;)

Los Angeles, California  
March, 2011

Stephanie felt like she was walking through a dream, her movements slowed and stiff as she followed Nate and Jonathan back to the spare room, back to Matt’s Murder Wall. None of it could be real - not Nate’s explanation of his hallucinations, the idea of a serial killer stuffing children into robotic suits, and certainly not her husband dying. At that exact moment, he was dying, somewhere she could not reach him. It was a dream. This was a dream.

Jonathan’s voice bounced around in Steph’s head, distant and spilling more nonsense. “Wait, are you telling me Afton picked up kids from this pizzeria and stuffed them into the animatronic suits until he was finished killing them? Wouldn’t someone notice? Those things were on full display during the daytime.”

Nate scanned over the articles on the Murder Wall again with new focus. He hadn’t known where to look before, but now, he had a lead. Finally, something caught his eye, and he snatched the article off its little red pin to hand to Jonathan who took it and started to read out loud: “‘Police were contacted when parents reportedly noticed what appeared to be blood and mucus around the eyes and the mouths of the mascots.’” Jonathan wrinkled his nose. “That’s definitely not what I would call normal.”

Stephanie squeezed in beside the two of them so she could see it for herself. Not a dream, unfortunately, not a dream. She read, “‘While the suspect has been charged, the bodies themselves were never found.’ What kind of monster…?”

Nate, still staring hard at the Wall, frowned deeply. “A very specific kind.”

“A brilliant kind,” Jonathan added and handed the article back to Nate. “I mean, without the bodies the suspect - who I’m assuming was Afton - couldn’t be held for anything and was released.” He shook his head. “No wonder he’s managed to kill so many. He knows exactly how to play the system.”

Not a dream. Definitely a nightmare.

Nate bit down on the inside of his cheek and nodded. “Keep your victims close and their bodies closer.” A particular headline caught his attention, one that they had seen earlier, but he hadn’t known to pay attention to it before, at least not the part that mattered: “‘Haunted’ Restaurant Condemned - To be Auctioned and Demolished.” Nate took it down, too, sighing.

“Well, no offense, Steph, but your husband who loves you very much was not as concerned for you as you thought. Here.” He passed her the article.

Stephanie was confused until she started reading, “‘Before being marked for resale, salvageable parts of the restaurant’s equipment and attractions are being evaluated by White Lawn Entertainment technicians, the public entertainment and attraction mogul that purchased the Freddy’s franchise.’ White Lawn Entertainment…” She looked up at Nate. “White, not wife?”

Jonathan nodded. “The voicemail. Matt said, ‘I think I found it. I think I know where he took them.’” Of course, he’d listened to the voicemail enough to have the whole thing memorized. Hours and hours of a pre-recorded guilt-trip because he’d been too pissy to do the right thing. “The suits were moved in the auction. No wonder it woke up the kids’ spirits!” Jonathan started back down the hall towards his laptop again.

Nate twisted his bracelet in thought. “Matt figured out where Afton put the bodies, and then he figured out where the bodies were taken. That’s why this article is the center of everything and the last clue he needed. You find the suits, you find the bodies, you find Afton.”

“You find Matthew,” Stephanie said with new hope flaring in her chest.

“You find Matthew,” Nate agreed with a smirk, realizing that Matt had put this all together on his own and had left them enough of a trail to come after him even after six years of avoiding all this. His big brother really was a genius.

“So, let’s go kill this monster.”

* * *

Digging and sorting through their collective pile of weapons and charms, Jonathan and Nate worked in silence. Loading guns, checking knives, they simply grabbed what they needed or even dropped things into the other one’s bag. It was a comfortable rhythm, one they hadn’t had since the hallucinations had started getting out of hand. But now with a target, with something to focus on other than Nate’s rapid descent into madness, they finally felt like partners again.

Stephanie, meanwhile, brewed fresh tea for the road while clacking away violently at the laptop. After a few minutes into their packing session, Nate could hear the printer in the living room whir to life, and by the time they were ready to go, tossing their bags over their shoulders and each grabbing their thermos of hot tea, Steph returned with three printed pages. “Here.”

Nate and Jonathan both took one, the third remaining in Stephanie’s hands. “What is this?” Nate asked, scanning the page. “The location?”

“A location,” Stephanie specified and held up her sheet for him to see. “White Lawn has close to two, three hundred facilities under that name, but only about twenty of them are in California, and only three of the ones nearby are production facilities, equipped to handle the kind of inspection the article mentioned.”

Jonathan nodded as he checked over the direction included on his sheet. “How did you find all this out?”

Stephanie drummed her hands on the countertop and nodded back towards the laptop. “Matthew isn’t the only one around here who knows how to research something.”

“So, we have to check out three locations?” Nate asked.

“Yes.” Stephanie nodded.

“While Matt’s expiration date is very, very quickly approaching?”

“Also, yes.”

“Great. Easy as pie.” He turned to Jonathan. “So, we each take one and then meet up at the third location?”

Stephanie scoffed. “Um, excuse me?” Nate and Jonathan both looked at her in unison, and she swore she could have knocked their big, stupid heads together. “There are three locations? Three people standing in this room right now? Matt’s expiration date? We’re each going to one of them!”

Nate took one of Stephanie’s hands between both of his and leaned down to her level like a parent being overly-patient with a toddler. “Yeah, that’s a no. You might’ve conned your way into going to Freddy’s, but you’re not coming on this. Especially not alone.”

Steph jerked her hand back from him. “Oh, I’m not, am I?”

“No, you’re not,” Nate said, straightening and rolling his eyes at her. “I think I just made that abundantly clear.”

Scoffing again, she looked to Jonathan for help, but he only held up his hands and backed away. “Don’t look at me. I’m not getting involved in this.”

So instead Stephanie grabbed Nate by the collar of his shirt and pulled him back down to her level so she could glare straight into his eyes. “How is going after Afton at these places any different from going after him at Freddy’s?”

Nate, without flinching or so much as missing a beat, answered, “Because I know Freddy’s, and I was there with you. You are not going up against a shtriga without backup, that’s just how it is, Stephanie!”

Jonathan made a noise of choked terror, and as Nate looked up at him, he suddenly realized what he had said. Steph let go of his shirt. “A ‘shtriga’? What is that?” Jonathan’s glare at Nate only hardened as Nate silently begged for help. But there was nothing Jonathan could do to save them now. Nate had let the proverbial cat out of the bag.

Stephanie threw her hands into the air. “Okay, now what aren’t you telling me? Is that just some fancy serial killer category?”

Nate swallowed while ducking his head. “Uh, more or less.”

“It doesn’t matter what it is,” Jonathan interjected, causing Nate to wince as Stephanie’s eyes sharpened. “The point is that-”

“Oh no! No! You do not get to use my brain to figure out where Matthew is and then run off into some mano y mano showdown and leave me back here in the dust without any answers!” At the end of her wits, Stephanie grabbed back the pages from them and smacked them onto the counter. Jonathan looked to Nate, but he was only shaking his head as if Jonathan should’ve known better. Stephanie hated being the third wheel to their silent conversations almost as much as she hated that they were still hiding something from her. “What did you just call this madman, and what does it mean?”

Nate felt like his head might explode at any moment. “Steph, we don’t have time-”

“So, talk quickly then!” she demanded, and the look in her eyes told him that he was only wasting time trying to win this battle.

Nate pinched the bridge of his nose and wondered if Matthew ever won any of the fights he had with Stephanie, though he figured he could guess the answer. “Matt should be the one to tell you this.”

Stephanie’s voice dropped then to a very quiet, very dangerous whisper, “Well, he’s not here right now, is he?” She spread her hands to either side of her. “You’re wasting time, Nathan. What aren’t you telling me? What is this big huge secret that you think is going to make me turn against Matthew because I’ll - what - realize I made a mistake when I married him?”

“Because you’ll realize you married a hero when you married him,” Nate responded quickly, dropping his gaze.

Jonathan seemed half shocked and half impressed by the answer, but Stephanie just recoiled. “Why? Because he tried to kill a serial killer?”

“Because he tried to stop a monster,” Nate said, stopping her train of thought with an expression so solemn that Stephanie had to believe him. No one, not while Nathan Smith was still breathing, would ever think his brother was anything less than a hero. “He tried to kill a literal, actual non-human monster. Because that’s what Afton is, a monster. He’s not human.”

Steph blinked. “Are you being serious right now? Like, not metaphorical at all?”

Nate leaned his elbows onto the counter and stared across at her, his hands framing the air in front of him. “Connect the dots, Steph. The weapons, the tracking down a serial killer, the obsession, the Murder Wall, the hallucinations, the cryptic messages.” He watched her expression turn from blank confusion to something like terror as she did just that, and Nate hated it. Hated that he had to pull back the curtains and show her what he knew. Because there was no going back - Matt was proof positive of that. “Now throw in the occasional ‘hunting trips’ my family used to go on, and what does that equal?”

Figuring it out wasn’t hard. Nate had all but spelled it out for her now, but Stephanie still staggered back, because accepting it was a whole different ball game. She caught herself against the wall of the kitchen and pressed the heel of her hand to her forehead. “Monsters, non-human monsters, dark, evil, things, they’re real?”

Jonathan and Nate nodded.

Her eyes wandered to Nate, “And you hunt them?” Then to Jonathan, “You all hunt them? Like some sort of sick hobby?”

Nate took a deep breath. “It’s more like the… family business. Saving people…”

Jonathan shrugged. “Hunting things…”

“Shooting serial killers,” Stephanie added for them.

A little humor returned to Nate’s voice as he shrugged it off. “I know, it’s painfully cliche at this point, but it is a living…”

“It’s actually not.” Jonathan rubbed his eyes. “Why do you think we do music on the side? Live in an RV that roaches would consider beneath them? Killing these monsters, keeping civvies safe, it doesn’t exactly help us afford the luxuries of a normal life.”

Stephanie wouldn’t meet their gaze at that point, and Nate could see the path that her brain was taking. He needed to turn her around before she started calling the cops. “Listen, I know what you’re thinking…”

“You don’t know what I’m thinking,” she growled back.

Nate held up a hand. “- But Bigfoot is actually a myth. I’m so sorry I had to be the one to tell you, but there it is.”

Jonathan tutted his tongue while shaking his head. “Better to find it out here than on the streets.”

Nate thought he saw a vein pop out on Stephanie’s forehead then. “Are you two kidding me? My husband - your brother - has been kidnapped by an evil something and you’re just standing around, yucking it up? What about any of this is funny?”

With all the sincerity that he can muster, Nate looked her square in the eyes and told her, “Nothing about this is funny, but honestly, when you’ve seen the things that we’ve seen…”

“Done the things we’ve done…” Jonathan continued.

“And lost the people we’ve lost?” Nate rubbed one hand up and down his arm as if to rub away chill bumps. “Sometimes being a little crazy is the only way to stay sane. This life - knowing the truth - it sucks.”

He side-stepped the counter then and - not to steal the papers like Stephanie assumed - put his hands on his sister-in-law’s shoulders. “It sucks so bad, Matt never told you. I’ve been trying my hardest not to tell you, just so you could go on and have a normal life. Not have to wonder about the things that go bump in the night, or have the paranoia of knowing literally anyone around you could be a monster. We were both just trying to protect you.”

Jonathan’s face screwed up a little. “Not in a sexist way, either. My parents don’t know what I do, and I pray to God they never find out.” He played with his curls for a moment in thought. “You just don’t tell the people you love because you want them to live in a kind world, and that’s not the world we live in.”

While she would normally brush off the gesture as condescending, Stephanie was glad in that moment that Nate was holding onto her shoulders. If he hadn’t been, she probably would’ve fallen right over. But instead, she pressed the backs of her hands into her eyes, took a deep breath, and nodded before looking up again. “Okay so, ‘shtriga,’ right? What is it, and how do we kill it?”

Regret became a glimmer of pride in Nate’s eyes as he watched Stephanie set her shoulders instead of running away screaming. “Shtrigas are a kind of witch. Only instead of riding around on broomsticks, these guys get their kicks feeding on kids’ souls.” He set his bag on the countertop and drew out the knife he’d given her before, grabbing the handle and pulling it from its sheath to show her the blade. “You kill them with iron, but only while he’s feeding. That’s our window.”

“Really?” Jonathan asked like he’d honestly never heard it before, and Stephanie was surprised.

“Wait, you don’t know?” She gestured to the pile of weapons and other weird stuff that had accumulated in her kitchen. “I thought this was your life.”

“Doesn’t mean anyone actually knows what they are doing. Why do you think Afton got away with it for so long?” Nate traced the edge of his thumbnail along one of the seams in the bag as he thought. “My dad - say what you will about him - was one of the best, but even he didn’t know about a shtriga’s weakness until six years ago when Matt and I… discovered it.”

Steph’s face blanched a little, but she held her ground. “Okay, so iron, while he’s feeding. Anything else?”

Nate pushed the knife into her hands and palmed the gun lying on the table. “Yeah: don’t let it get away.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Surprise! In case it wasn't terribly obvious now, this series is not only a FNaF/Step-brothers!AU, but it is mostly and primarily a Supernatural!AU!
> 
> Being there one in the relationship that had loved Supernatural for about 7 years and finally talked the other into watching it, it was my idea to keep the Supernatural part out of it until this exact moment. I knew Reverse probably didn't have a lot of followers (who are our main audience for this) who loved or were super familiar with Supernatural, and didn't want to alienate anyone from giving this AU a try. Plus, I just really wanted to see if we could pull this little trick off. And so far, we have!
> 
> To answer the biggest question, no, you do not have to be super familiar with Supernatural to "get" Devil May Care. We use a lot of crossover elements and some of the same characters (a couple clever readers already pointed out John and Mary's names), but we go a completely different direction in Devil May Care, one that focuses on our boys instead of the Winchester boys. But yes, this more or less takes place in the Supernatural universe. More or less.
> 
> TL;DR: It's a Supernatural!AU, but no, you don't need to know the show to "get" this series.
> 
> So, that's it. Surprise! I'll now be FINALLY going in and updating all the tags and such since at long last, the truth is out there!


	4. Divide and Conquer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here you go! A nice long chapter for your binging needs.
> 
> Don't forget, we have a blog for the series now! It's been tons of fun making memes and chatting with y'all about the AU so far. There might even be a couple surprises around those parts soon :)
> 
> devil-may-care-series.tumblr.com

Los Angeles, California  
March, 2011

A canopy of stars hung overhead as Jonathan pulled to a stop in the parking lot, giant lights illuminating the sign of “White Lawn Ent. Warehouse.” With his phone pressed between his cheek and his shoulder, he started digging around in his bag for his EMF reader.

 _“Just make sure you’re ready to gun it to the third location if Steph says she found anything,”_ Nate barked at him through the phone, and Jonathan had to admit he was practically tickled by how quickly Nate had become so protective over his firecracker sister-in-law he didn’t even know existed this time a week ago.

“Sure thing, Smith. You just be sure to keep that self-sacrificing streak of yours under control in case you find the suits. Don’t go sticking your neck out before we can get there.” He got nothing in reply but a garbled string of excuses which he more or less ignored.

_“I’m flattered you care, Johnny, but you should be more concerned with getting into that warehouse. Tell me, how, exactly, do you plan on doing that again?”_

Jonathan popped open the glove compartment and peered in at the dozens of fake IDs and badges he had. Wiggling his fingers, he plucked one from the batch and hung it around his neck with a smirk. “Oh, I’ll think of something.”

“Union rep?” the guard at the front gate asked as Jonathan flashed his ID.

When the guard looked up at him, Jonathan flashed a smile, too, one that kissed babies and told a girl’s mom he’d have them back by ten, and one that no one could say no to. The guard just buzzed him through. Jonathan saluted him as he strode through the doors like walking on easy street.

Once he was inside, he dug his phone out of his pocket again and put it to his ear, strolling casually down one hallway and rounding a corner like he actually knew where he was going. “Hear that, Smith?”

“Yeah, yeah, don’t let that head get any bigger or they’ll be able to see it from space.” Nate was grinning, though, as the Firebird picked up a little more speed. One step closer to finding Matt, that’s all he cared about. He could see his assigned facility in the distance now.

Jonathan gave a wave to two more guards and held up the badge again. They waved him along without question. “What about you, handsome? Any ideas how you’re going to get in?”

Nate glanced at the old uniform currently riding in his passenger seat, the hat sitting on top, badge glinting in the lights coming off his dash. “Not everyone needs a fancy seventy-five dolar fake ID to get them everywhere in life, not when you’ve lived the part, anyway.”

“That dingy old uniform you always carried around? This is a high-tech place, Nate, you think they’ll fall for that?” Jonathan spotted a man with a toolbelt and asked for directions before pressing the phone to his ear again.

“Trust me,” Nate rolled his eyes. “I know night guards. We’re not an intelligent breed.”

“Well, I can’t argue with you there.” Jonathan finally spotted the sign for the production floor. “Gotta go. Don’t do anything stupid.”

_“Come on, Johnny, have a little faith.”_

“I have faith you’ll do something stupid.”

_“Bye, Jonathan.”_

Jonathan dropped his phone back into his pocket and glanced into a locker room full of vests and hard hats. He ducked inside and swiped one of each before pushing through into the next room full of machinery in constant, whirring motion. The whole floor was just one big bee’s nest of activity, and he turned on the EMF reader, hopeful that it might give him a direction from there. But the little machine went wild the moment it came to life. Jonathan muffled the sound quickly and shut it off. No good. Just like Steph said, too much machinery was interfering with its readings.

He’d have to be sure to tell her later how impressed he was.

When he spotted someone with a toolbelt, Jonathan headed in their direction instead. “Excuse me...” He caught sight of a name patch on the guy’s uniform. “Hank, is it? What wing are those big animatronics from that restaurant place, uh, Freddy’s, at?”

The guy, sporting a salt and pepper beard and the most intense green eyes Jonathan had ever seen, looked at him like he’d suddenly grown a second head. “What are you talking about?”

Jonathan scratched the back of his head with an easy-going smile, hoping that would stop Hank from looking him over too closely. “Those big giant animals that dance and sing and all that? Rotted to hell? Corporate sent me down here to check in on things.”

Still suspicious, Hank hooked one thumb in his toolbelt and gave Jonathan a sideways glance. “I think Corporate screwed you over. There’s nothing like that here. We just work on big steel framework.”

Jonathan snapped his fingers. One down, two to go. “Son of... Hey, at least I’m getting over time, right?”

Finally, Hank cracked a smile. “I hear that!”

Sheepish, Jonathan tilted his head to the side. “Any idea what branch I was supposed to go to?”

But Hank just adjusted his hardhat and shook his head. “Afraid not. Sorry.” He waved and started to leave, and once his back was turned, Jonathan whipped out his phone to call Nate.

No answer.

So, he tried Stephanie instead. She still hadn’t made it to her location, the West branch in this area of the state. It was the furthest away from home, so if she ended up with the jackpot it would give Jonathan and Nate time to get to her. When she picked up, her voice sounded so hopeful. _“Jonathan? Is he there?”_

He walked as he spoke, a quick pace back to the parking lot. “Nah, Steph, East is a bust. I’m headed your way now.” Once he unlocked his car and got in, Jonathan could practically feel Steph’s nervousness through the phone. “Hey, don’t stress. You’ll do great, okay?”

Stephanie nodded as she pulled into the parking lot of West and took a deep breath to ready herself. “Yeah, yeah. I’ll be fine.”

_“Call if you find anything.”_

“Of course.” When Stephanie hung up and tossed her phone into her purse, she could feel her whole body buzzing with energy. She’d gone over her plan in her head at least a hundred times on the drive over, but now it was real. Now she was actually about to do this. “Okay, Steph, it’s no big deal. Just sneaking into a heavily guarded facility to find the monster that has been torturing your husband. It’s every woman’s dream.”

She let out a frustrated squeal and gathered her things before getting out of the car. On the walk to the front door, she double-checked the hunting knife hidden away in her suit jacket. She was wearing her old pantsuit from her days as a consultant, figuring if she looked the part that was at least half the battle. The other half would be not hyperventilating on the spot and sticking to her story. Once inside, she strode through the lobby to the front desk, heels clicking on the linoleum floors, with a bright smile on her face.

Two guards sat behind a sheet of glass looking bored but at least slightly attentive.

She drummed her fingers on the edges of the clipboard she held firmly in her hands, clinging to it for dear life as she began her rehearsed lines, “Hi, my name is Adrianne Palicki, I’m from East Coast Auction Houses, and my boss sent me over to check up on the properties you have here that we’ll be auctioning off soon?”

The guards exchanged a look before one of them, a woman in her forties with round glasses and a voice like a life-time chainsmoker, cleared her throat and said, “East Coast Auction House? I’m afraid I’m not familiar with them. You said we had properties of yours?”

Stephanie glanced down at her clipboard, flipping through some of the papers she’d printed out. “Yes, four large… ‘animatronics’ from… ‘Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza’? I guess they’re… animals of some kind?”

The woman checked an outdated computer, clicking through a log for a bit before shaking her head. “Well, I haven’t heard of any new shipments getting here recently, and I’m not seeing anything here either.”

“This would have been three weeks ago, on the eighth.” Stephanie leaned forward, but she couldn’t see the screen herself, only its reflection in the woman’s glasses.

“I’m afraid I don’t have any shipments arriving since the thirteenth of last month,” she said, shaking her head.

Stephanie bit the corner of her lip and drummed her fingers again. “Maybe that’s it?”

“Not likely.” The woman looked up at Stephanie and jutted her thumb at the screen. “Unless your animatronics were made out of office supplies, it wasn’t.”

Stephanie could feel herself deflate a little. Matthew wasn’t here. “Oh, well, no, definitely not office supplies. Okay - let me double check with my boss, and I guess I will be back here tomorrow.”

“Sorry about that,” the woman answered back. Maybe she could see a little of the genuine disappointment in Stephanie’s eyes, because she did sound like she meant it.

Steph dredged up a smile, though even she knew that it seemed a bit forced. “No worries. It’s kind of a relief, actually, means I get to go home!”

The guard just waved. “Have a good night!”

“You too,” and Stephanie turned for the door, already feeling in her purse for her phone. Once outside in the night air, she took a few deep breaths, cackling a little as the pressure slowly wore off. She tried Nate with no luck and then called Jonathan. When he answered, she was already talking. “I can see why you do this job… Jonathan? There was nothing here, they haven’t had any shipments in the last month.”

Jonathan pulled over onto the side of the road and slammed his fist against the steering wheel. “Dang it, that means they’re at South with Nate. No wonder he hasn’t been answering his phone.”

Steph hesitated as she reached for her keys. “Of course. He’s probably getting into trouble as we speak.” She finally got the car unlocked and climbed in, starting the engine while her knee bobbed nervously.

“I’ll turn around,” Jonathan was already doing it as he said it. “Meet me there as fast as you can.”

Pulling out of the parking lot, she hit the road and gunned it. “Heading that way now.”

* * *

A few minutes earlier…

The facility was small, maybe too small, with only a few other cars parked in the fenced-off lot he currently stood in. Nate shrugged on the old night guard’s jacket, slipped on his glasses, and twisted the old hat in his hands. He approached the gate looking nervous, chewing on his lip, and trying to ignore the feeling of blood and engine oil under his fingernails - yet another hallucination nagging at him.

The guards in the box at the gate look up at him. “Yes?”

Nate tugged on his ear, adjusting his glasses. “Hi, uh, I started last week, and someone just called and said I left my wallet here? Can you buzz me in?”

They swapped a look between each other, and Nate flashed them another innocent smile. In his old glasses again, wearing that moth-eaten uniform, he could be sixteen years-old - just starting his first shift at Freddy’s. Eventually the guards nodded and buzzed him in.

“Fine, but be quick. The manager’s office is down the hall on your right.”

Nate nodded, a grateful smile. “You got it, in and out. Thanks, chief.”

He slipped inside and released the breath he’d been holding tight in his chest. Past the security office where a little girl stood in one corner, and Nate gave them a quick courtesy nod while eyeing her. He kept his focus ahead, though. He didn’t have time for ghosts right now when he needed to find his brother.

Ducking around one corner after the next, smiling at employees, suddenly Nate caught another glimpse of her at the end of one dimly lit hallway, like one of the overhead lights had gone out. She flickered. He followed.

She stood beside a door, one that seemed to open from the bottom up, metal, like maybe it was the access to an elevator of sorts. It would make sense. If this was a storage facility, it was far too small to keep something as big as the animatronics, so they must be underground. He tried to lift it, but it wouldn’t budge.

Nate looked back to the girl. “You know, I never really believed you were all in my head, Charlie.” She tilted her head at him, and Nate scoffed. “I don’t mean to make demands or anything, but a little help would be nice for once. Since I’m doing this for you? A little ghost mojo or something? For old time’s sake?”

She raised her little eyebrow, and Nate winced. She’d learned far too much from watching the world through his eyes, sass being chief among them. He rolled his eyes at her. “Fine, I’ll have to do this myself. The hard way. Like _always_.” He doubled-back to one of the hallways where he saw a security guard, palming his card as he bumped into him, lifting it from his belt with practiced ease. “Sorry! Got a little turned around!”

With the card in hand, he worked his way back around to the dark hallway, but when he reached it, he froze. Matthew stood at the end before walking through that same locked door and disappearing. Nate jogged after him. “Matt! Shoot!” He looked at the door again and down at the card in his hand. He should call Jonathan or Steph, let them know he found Matt.

But they’d want him to wait. They’d want to go with him, and he knew how deadly Afton was. And he didn’t want to drag them into it.

He scanned the security card, and the metal door rolled open on command, revealing an ancient service elevator made of metal grating and exposed steel springs. The last thing Nate wanted to do at that moment was climb into the thing, but Matthew was out of time. Nate stepped inside, pulling the grate closed behind him and punching the button for the elevator to descend.

This uniform always brought him bad luck.

Outside in the parking lot, Jonathan watched Stephanie drive up and got out to meet her. She’d already changed back into jeans and sneakers, and she wrung her hands together as she approached Jonathan. “Where is he?”

“He’s inside. I already checked in the Firebird, and he won’t answer his phone,” Jonathan answered through gritted teeth.

“Crap,” Steph hissed, glancing at the storage center. “How are we supposed to go in and save him? We can’t both sneak in, can we?”

Jonathan folded his hands on top of his head and turned away from her, wracking his brain for any ideas that might get them both inside. “I don’t know. I think we need a distraction of some kind.” Steph looked around until something seemed to dawn on her, and her gaze snapped back to Jonathan as he raised an eyebrow. “You got something?”

“Only the quickest way I’ve ever seen a building empty out. You got a lighter?”


	5. This Can't Be Good

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The last upload for this week, and it's a doozy! I know there's probably going to be one or two (or more...) questions after this one, so don't forget that you can always ask me and Becca about DMC on our shared Tumblr blog! We're both More than happy to gab about this story and the thoughts behind it (no spoilers, though, of course). There's already been some... fun discussions there recently about the boys, and we can't wait to see more as the story progresses!  
> -Reverse

Los Angeles, California  
March, 2011

The elevator opened, and Nate moved aside the metal grate with a horrible metallic screech. So much for the element of surprise. He stepped out, looking down both ends of the hallway he stood in. Nothing but darkness, so he pulled his maglight off his belt and turned it on. Little more than dust and shadows greeted him, no surprise party, no shtriga holding birthday cake, and no Matt. “This can’t be good.”

Over his head, up on the ground floor, Nate could hear an alarm sound as red lights flashed across the ceiling, casting a whole new level of horror over this scene, which meant - he guessed - that his cavalry had arrived. “Oh, this is my new favorite thing. This just really completes the whole murder aesthetic.”

And then he heard crying behind him, whirling around to see a little girl, blonde and sweet, her limbs and neck contorted at unnatural angles. The tears dripped down her cheeks as she sobbed, looking up at him with pleading eyes.

She was missing limbs, limbs that he knew were attached when she had died.

Nate stumbled back from her. “Oh God… Oh God, I’m sorry.”

Around him, more children appeared in similar states of mangled death, so horrible that Nate had to swallow down the bile that rose in his throat. They cried and whined and reached their twisted arms towards him, and Nate raised his hands to either side of his head as if to protect himself from them. He turned and turned, around and around, trying to get away, but they were everywhere.

And then teeth, snapping at him from the shadows suddenly, narrowly missed taking his face off as he staggered back a few more steps, his flashlight illuminating the face of a familiar animatronic. The dead eyes stared at him, pleading just like the little girl’s had, limbs missing.

“Oh, Foxy…”

He turned again as the other animatronics slowly surrounded him, limbs gone or hanging out of place by one or two wires, faces deconstructed, insides spilling from their chest cavities in rusted, tangled gore. Blinking, the scene changed. Checkered tile floor splattered with puddles of dark, viscous slime, music, a phone ringing, and children screaming far in the background - he could barely breathe for the stench of death in the air around him.

Nate pressed his fingers over his ears, pleading, “Stop! Stop! I know what happened, and I’m here to help, alright?” Then he swept the flashlight across their faces again, but in the depths of their eyes, the single pinprick of light that reflected back at him, he saw no recognition. Their jaws unhinged, dropped open, and screaming, they all lept at him at once.

* * *

Watching the fire they started harmlessly in the dumpster out back begin to draw the security guards away from the door, Jonathan leaned through the window, buzzed them in, and Steph held the door open as they slipped inside. They raced through the hallways, checking around every corner. Jonathan kept dialing Nate’s cell.

“Come on… come on… Nate! Pick up!” He looked instead to Stephanie who was sweeping the EMF reader in front of her as they walked. “Anything on that?” But just glancing at it, he could tell.

“No, it’s not spiking or anything. Not even a little.” They paused, the lights of the fire alarms flashing around them. “What if they aren’t here at all?” Steph cried, sounding more desperate than ever. “What if I led us to the wrong locations?”

“You didn’t,” Jonathan insisted. “They’re here. They have to be. It’s the only reason Nate wouldn’t answer his phone. We just have to _find _them. Nate! Nathan!”__

__“Matthew!” Stephanie cried, and they pressed on, further into the building, jogging as they went, until the EMF reader screamed in Steph’s hand. She stopped, just in front of a service elevator._ _

__Jonathan noticed that she was no longer following and turned back. “Stephanie?”_ _

__“This thing spiked suddenly, right here.” She pointed at the elevator, moved further down the hall, and back again. The reader spiked once more, and Steph and Jonathan looked from it to each other, and then to the door._ _

* * *

Nate hit the ground hard, his glasses scraping the concrete as his cheek made impact with the cold concrete. He binked, then gasped and rolled to the side before a metal hook dug into the floor through the old security guard's hat, which had flown off and landed nearby. It was now ruined, but Nate had little time to care. He threw up his arms to block Freddy’s arm from crashing down onto his chest, feeling his wrist crack in pain. As Freddy lifted his massive metal fist for another attack, Nate sprang up and darted under Chica’s snapping beak only for Bonnie to snag him by his collar and throw him headlong into one of the walls.

Nate crashed to the floor again, the breath knocked from his lungs, multiple areas throbbing in pain. He clutched his potentially broken arm to his chest and scrambled back from the approaching animatronics. “Guys, guys, it’s me! It’s Nate, you know me! You’ve been in my head since I was a kid!” Nate saw no recognition in their eyes, if they were even capable of that at this point. He wasn’t sure, but he pleaded with them all the same, desperately yanking the shattered plastic glasses off his face. “Please, I’m trying to help you! I swear!”

Their eyes flashed, ready for another onslaught.

Nate scrambled back to his feet to run, but a sudden strike across his back sent him sprawling through the closest doorway. His head cracked against the floor as he rolled to a stop inside, bumping into something taller than himself as the dust around him settled.

Moaning, he pushed himself up again. He winced at the pressure on his injured wrist and fell back, suddenly realizing he was nose to nose with something - a chair, actually, a chair with a man on it, bound and gagged.

Nate didn’t notice the door swing closed and lock behind him.

He forced himself up to his feet in a heartbeat, calling the name that had been on his mind for over a week now. Touching the person’s arms, their face, their long, thick hair, he knew his brother even before Matthew opened his eyes.

“Matt!” Nate practically laughed, dizzy with relief. "Matt! It’s me, it’s Nate. I’m here.” Matt only groaned around the cloth stuffed into his mouth, and Nate grabbed the large hunting knife from his pocket to quickly saw through the gag, fumbling a little since his good arm throbbed like it was in pieces. He took the stiff, soiled cloth gingerly from Matt’s mouth and tossed it aside, softly reminding his brother that it was going to be okay now.

Matthew worked his jaw slowly, groaning in pain as his head nodded forward. Nate hovered close, hands and eyes scanning for any injuries, and mostly to prove that Matt was actually sitting in front of him, alive. “Take it easy, bud. I’m going to get you out of here.”

Nate set about sawing through the ropes next. They were thick and old, covered in sharp splinters and the skin around them on Matt’s wrists had been worn through. Both boys hissed as Nate pulled at the scabbing, puss-covered flesh. “Sorry, big guy. But you know, I bet that your lucky little Mrs. Patrick would give anything to get you back right about now, but you should really consider showering first. You’re a mess."

Matthew came back to life slowly, glancing around, trying to make sense of what he was seeing, feeling, hearing. “Nate…?”

Nate looked up at his brother, at his bloodied face, at red, swollen eyes, a voice that sounded like a record scratched and torn to hell. “Yeah, yeah, it's me. I’m - hah - actually here to rescue you. Just hang on, okay?” He put a hand on Matt’s shoulder again, felt the weak rise and fall of his chest as if to reassure himself. “Steph and Jonathan are waiting, at least I assume the alarm was them. It was probably them, which means they’re standing by to get us both home, safe and sound. It’s - it’s going to be okay.”

“I didn’t…” Matt wheezed, his eyes pouring over Nate. “I didn’t know…” He broke into a coughing fit, and Nate put a hand against his chest, to keep him upright. When he finally caught his breath again, Matt laughed, dry and pained. “Didn’t know if... you would come.”

Nate blinked up at Matt, stunned. Then ducking his head again, going back to sawing at the ropes, he nodded. “Of course I came.”

Finally, he got one arm free, then the other, tossing the bloodied ropes onto the floor, somewhere behind the chair where they couldn’t be tripped over. Nate had to catch his brother as he tipped forward again with another pained wheeze, his good hand firmly supporting Matt’s weight. “Whoa there, take it easy, big guy. I got you.”

He pushed Matt back as something dripped onto his hand. He realized - too late - that it was the same black ooze he’d seen before in his vision, the same ooze he’d seen in Charlotte’s eyes a thousand times. Black ectoplasm.

Matt threw himself from the chair suddenly, tackling Nate to the ground and smashing the back of his head against the concrete floor. He hauled the smaller man back to his feet, threw him against the wall like he was a kid again, sixteen years-old and scared out of his mind. One hand, stronger than should be physically possible, closed around Nate’s throat and pinned him in place, not choking him, just keeping him down.

Not that that tidbit did anything to relieve the panic pumping through Nate’s body.

William Afton smiled through Matthew’s face. “Well, well, well, he remembers my name,” the monster giggled. “And here, I guess you were right to always call me the smart one.” He tilted his head to the side, more of the ectoplasm streaking down his cheeks.

Nate struggled against the hand holding him in place and tried to throw Matthew off of him. Any other time, it wouldn’t be a problem, but something was terribly, terribly wrong. And this was not his brother looking at him. His eyes wandered over the room then, noting the candles, the altar, the sigils painted around him on the floor.

He was so stupid for not noticing them earlier.

“What did he do to you?” Nate gasped, clawing at Matt’s arms.

“Who, me?” Matthew’s voice was perky, full of life and enthusiasm, practically singing. It didn’t sound human. “Not a thing, Nate. No, he hasn’t touched a single hair on my head. Which I can say is a fate you won’t be sharing.” With his other hand, he tussled Nate’s hair like Matthew would do when they were kids, to get on Nate’s nerves. Now though, it had a far more visceral effect.

It pissed him off.

Nate gritted his teeth and glared deep into his brother’s eyes. “He suck on you, did he? Stick his evil shtriga straw into your soul and start slurping?”

Matt giggled, shrill and unnatural and grating at his throat. “Well, aren’t you a clever lyricist? But he hasn’t taken anything from me, not really. Just gave me a little extra something to live for.” Drawing back a step, Matt lifted Nate from the wall and threw him again, this time into the chair that sat in the middle of the room.

A scream pierced the air as Nate fell. And Matthew stalked back to Nate with glee in his hazel eyes, ready to snatch him up again, enjoying getting to toss around his little toy, but Nate slashed suddenly through the air with his long iron hunting knife. Matt dodged in time only for Nate to kick the chair he’d landed on at Matthew’s feet, tripping him up and sending him sprawling. The instant he hit the ground, Nate was on top of him.

He pinned his big brother on his stomach, his knee in the center of Matt’s spine. “I don’t want to hurt you, Matthew,” Nate cried, “but I’ve got to snap you out of this!”

Matt thrashed beneath him, feral with rage and the black magic swirling behind his eyes. His voice barely sounded like his own anymore as he screeched, “It’s a bit late for that, little brother!”

Grabbing at a piece of rope on the floor, Matt threw it back at Nate’s face. He only flinched for a moment, an instinct reaction, but it was just enough for Matt to buck him off, shove him down onto the floor, and punch him across the face a few times. Nate blocked with the knife only to have it torn away, ripping further at his injured wrist. Matt closed one hand around the hilt and moved the blade to Nate’s throat, licking his lips in anticipation.

“Matt!” Nate groaned, bloody and beaten and staring into the face of his older brother who was mad with hate and twisted by pure evil. “It’s me - it’s your brother, please!”

Again Matt giggled, that terrible laughter that bounced through the room above their heads. “I know! My loud, obnoxious, screwed-up little brother who ruined my life, not once but twice!” He brushed back Nate’s bangs with the tip of the blade, a smile cracking his lips. “Why do you think I’m going to enjoy killing you so much?”

Striking Nate in the head with the handle of the knife, sending an explosion of pain across Nate’s vision and senses, Matthew pinned one arm to the ground and raised the blade above their heads. Nate’s eyes were still rolling around, and he couldn’t even find Matthew in his spinning vision, much less the dark blade.

Outside, the beating, hammering fists of the animatronics trying to force their way in... stopped. Nate blinked a few times, grimacing against forming bruises, and glanced around in confusion. Above him, with his legs still straddling Nate’s torso and the blade ready to strike, Matt was frozen. His body twitched all over, convulsing. Slowly, mechanically, like one of the animatronics, Matt turned his head, and Nate turned too. A black, billowing figure appeared in the room, its hands spread wide, long, skeletal fingers curling and uncurling.

It was the thing that haunted Nate’s worst nightmares, fueled every waking terror that haunted the corners of his vision, the thing that had killed his mother, the thing that had driven his dad insane, and the thing that had tortured his brother for a week. This was William Afton. And Nate’s eyes burned with a poisonous hatred.

Afton flicked his hand and sent Matt flying off Nate, into the opposite wall. He crumbled in a bony, broken heap onto the floor, and Nate could hear the sickening crack of his head hitting the tile hard.

“Matt!”

He tried to get up, tried to crawl across the floor to his brother, but Afton was on him in an instant, pressing one ghostly hand to Nate’s chest, crushing him, looming over him. A strangled cry escaped Nate’s throat. He couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe. He could only catch a glimpse of Matthew in the corner of his eye, and he couldn’t be sure he was even still alive.

He couldn’t live with his brother’s ghost inside his head.

But then again, he might not have to.

Under the hood, he could see Afton smile. He inched closer, slowly, savoring every twitch, every moment Nate fought against him with hardly a single ounce of hope left. “I’ve waited… so long for this moment. So long… just to finish you off… once and for all.”

“Get a life,” Nate gasped and twisted beneath Afton’s weight, his hands pinned uselessly to the floor by billowing darkness.

Afton laughed, a hollow vibration in his chest, at the accidental joke, at the irony of the statement. Nate, however, wasn’t laughing with him.

Instead, Nate’s skin was rapidly beginning to pale, his lips turning blue. He was suffocating, unable to force breath into his crushed lungs. Still he fought, helplessly, with only the thought that his ghost would be so pissed if he let himself die right now, this close to killing Afton, this close to saving Matthew. He couldn’t just die. He couldn’t.

Afton’s grin split open wide as he inhaled, and a light from deep inside of Nate was forced out through his blue lips, up and up, and between Afton’s monstrous teeth. It was worse than suffocating, worse than dying. A black pit opened inside of him, cold and empty and terrible. It was like having all the best parts of himself torn away, only to leave the ugly underbelly exposed, the meat cleaver of a hunter with no regard for anyone, even himself - a version of Nate he tried to hide behind cocky smiles and dark shades and a snarky attitude.

Suddenly, from above his head, or maybe inside of it, Nate heard an all-too-familiar scream, a little girl, her face drenched in blue, oily tears. It was furious, deafening, the scream of someone too young to be full of such rage. It drew Afton’s attention away from feeding, and Nate’s eyes rolled back into his head.

Afton would’ve paled at the sight of her if he had any color in his face to begin with.

“You!”

Her little head fell to the side, like a puppet who’d cut its strings, and her little mouth lolled open as words spilled out, charged with hatred, soft as a whisper but filling up the room, “ _It’s me… _”__

Something was wrapped around Afton from behind suddenly, a length of rope. Nate flinched back from the figure in the haze of his pain, barely able to make out the face of his brother or the knife held over Afton’s chest. “This is for hurting my family,” Matthew growled, his throat raw and torn, and he plunged the knife deep into Afton’s chest while his face still glowed with a piece of Nate’s soul.

Everything was silent. Too silent, like the world had become a vacuum, the billowing robes of Afton’s form sucking up even the smallest noises into its folds before it exploded outwards in one swift wave of black smoke and magic and fire. Matt was flung backwards again, and Nate was washed in the heat, unable to escape it until it passed. A scream of pure anguish, Afton’s this time, sliced through the air as the shtriga vanished from sight, leaving not a single trace of the monster behind.

Nate wheezed and fought for every thin, violent breath. His body curled inward with the pain of that fight, but he clung to life, clung to consciousness, terrified of what would happen if he fell asleep now. Matthew sat up slowly, trying to orient himself through the ache in his arms and legs, his head, his everything. The sound of Nate’s strangled breathing finally drew him back to reality, and he desperately crawled across the floor to his brother’s side.

“Nate, Nate!” Matt helped him to sit up, leaning him into his shoulder as Nate finally took gulps of air, clinging tight to Matthew’s shirt. He tried to see into his little brother’s eyes as the alarm lights continued to flash in the room. It didn’t take much light to see that his eyes were bloodshot and rimmed with tears, distant, like he was deep beneath the surface of himself.

“Hey, hey, hey, stay awake, okay? Look at me. I’m here, Nate,” Matt wheezed past a broken voice, wrapping aching, clumsy arms around his brother and squeezing. “I’m right here…”

Slowly, Nate’s eyes began to focus as he searched for Matt’s face. “Thought I… was supposed to be the one… saving you…” And when they met eyes, Matt smiled, his cracked, bloodied lips and cheeks puffing with a delirious laugh - one that was his own again. And Nate smiled, too, clapping his brother on the chest. They both leaned against each other, just trying to catch their breaths in the cramped, musty room.

* * *

It took them what felt like forever to finally drag each other to their feet, and - arms wrapped around one another - they limped back out through the main hallway where Matthew saw the animatronics and flinched so violently he nearly threw them both off balance. But the robots were inactive, slumped against the walls with all the light gone out from their eyes.

Charlotte walked among them, tip-toeing carefully so as not to step on any part of the corpses, and Nate looked around. It was just him, his brother, and his resident ghost child now. It seemed almost too good to be true.

Charlie watched him with eyes full of tears, clear as crystal and washing the grime from her face. Nate felt himself crying, too. She raised her hand, a small wave, and then, she disappeared. Nate blinked and looked around, convinced it was only one of her tricks, but she was gone, really gone, at last.

He shuddered as a sob broke free, and Matt wordlessly hugged him a little tighter.

* * *

Several floors up, the alarms still blaring and flashing overhead, Jonathan tried once again to pry open the door to the service elevator with a crowbar. They didn’t have much time before the firefighters arrived, and they had to be out of there by then or run the risk of adding an arson charge onto their pile of troubles. But his grip slipped, and the crowbar skittered from his hands, across the floor. Jonathan kicked at the locked door, screaming in frustration.

Stephanie stood back with silent tears falling down her cheeks as she held a hand firm over her mouth. The EMF reader in her other hand had gone silent. She slipped down the wall to the floor, clutching her knees to her chest. Dropping the scanner, she buried her head in her arms and sobbed aloud, unable to hold back the storm inside her.

Jonathan heard her and turned, his anger quickly turning to sorrow with hers. He rested his arms on his head, staring in disbelief. He couldn’t have lost Nate too, not after everything. He begged him not to go in alone, but Nate never listened. If he’d just listened…

Then the elevator groaned to life behind him, rumbling louder and louder, until suddenly it stopped again, and the metal door slid open to reveal two bruised, bloody brothers, just barely holding one another up.

“Matthew!” Stephanie launched herself to her feet, threw her arms around Matthew, who slowly, clumsily wrapped his arms around her, too. She sobbed into his chest, and confused tears fell down Matthew’s face as he took her chin and tilted her face up so he could see her, finally see her, after he thought for days he never would again. Nate and Jonathan grabbed them both, pulling them from the elevator, but the couple collapsed part of the way, taking the boys with them.

They huddled there, for as long as they dared with the approaching sirens, clinging to one another. Jonathan reached around Matt and Steph to grab Nate’s shoulder, and Nate, for his part, offered a small, sincere smile back. They’d really done it. They’d killed Afton, set the children’s souls free, and saved his brother. And now… Nate shook his head, leaning his forehead into Matt’s shoulder.

He’d put his family back together.


	6. Home Again, Home Again

Los Angeles, California  
March, 2011

It was nearly six in the morning by the time they got back to Matt and Stephanie’s home. Jonathan and Nate parked in the street and rolled out of their cars quickly to help Steph get Matthew out of the passenger’s seat. Nate caught one arm as Matt folded out of the seat. “Easy, easy,” he assured him, “we gotcha…”

Jonathan nodded towards the house. “Let’s get him inside quick before the neighbors see.”

Matthew couldn’t even hold himself up on his own, and they walked him inside between the two of them, Stephanie casting nervous glances back at them as if she expected Matt to disappear again at any moment. Once inside, they carried him to the nearest couch and set him down gently, Matt groaning with even the smallest of movements. He stiffened, clutched at his side where he’d hit the wall, and panted like he’d just run a marathon instead of being half-carried twenty feet from the car.

Nate knelt beside him, all the while checking over his brother once again with gentle pokes and prods and restless eyes, feeling as nervous as he did the first day they met. “Hey, hey, relax, big guy. You’re home. You’re okay now.”

Matt leaned his head back and tried to relax, but every muscle in his body was aching now that the adrenaline had left him. He couldn’t stand the lights, not even the lamp next to the couch, so they turned them all off but one little desk lamp in the far corner. As Matt finally seemed to catch his breath, he muttered, “Been a while…. since you called me that…”

“Well, it’s been awhile since you tried to take on a shtriga all by yourself, you lummox,” Nate teased good-naturedly while continuing to inwardly tear himself apart for every bruise, every scratch. If he’d just listened to Matt that first night…

But Matt at least gave an attempt at a laugh as Stephanie flew to his side and took one of his hands in hers. “Jonathan is getting my first-aid kit, alright? I’ll get you something for the pain, get you cleaned up, wrap you in bandages like a mummy, and then you’re not moving off this couch for a week, you hear me?”

Matthew stared at her face like he was memorizing it, like he hadn’t already a hundred times over, and as he did, tears filled up his bloodshot eyes. “I’m so sorry, Stephanie.”

Her voice broke as she shook her head at him. “No, no, no, don’t you dare do this right now. You’re home, and - and you’re safe. And that’s all I care about.” She placed a hand on his cheek to thumb away some of the tears, careful not to touch his raw skin. “But I swear, if you do something like this again, I’ll kill you myself, just so you know.”

Matt leaned into her hand, shutting his eyes again, and he laughed, wheezing and coughing and groaning as his insides seemed all twisted up. Jonathan returned then with what looked like an oversized makeup bag, only it was filled with first-aid supplies and bottles of pills, and in the other hand, he held a glass of water, just like Steph had asked.

“Here you go,” he offered it to her as she slowly withdrew her hand from Matthew’s cheek. “I hope it’s the right one.”

“It is.” She brushed tears from her face and unzipped the bag. “Thank you, Jonathan.”

Nate stood and stepped back as she began rummaging through the bag for the necessary items. Matthew watched her all the while, reached up to touch her face where it wrinkled in thought, and Stephanie laughed at him. That laugh, that laugh that had been his last thoughts, it still made him smile.

Finding the right bottle of pills, Stephanie turned back to him with the glass of water and shook her head as she uncapped the bottle with her thumb. “What would you do without me?”

As she placed two of the pills into his outstretched palm, the one that was slightly less smeared with his own blood, he winced. “You want… an honest answer?”

“No, definitely no,” she said and set the pill bottle aside to take his shoulder. “Here, sit up, okay?”

Nate sprang to action then with his one good arm, lifting Matt up into a better sitting position while Stephanie slipped a pillow behind him to prop him up. With the sudden movement, Matt stiffened again, his muscles spasming, and when he finally uncurled his shoulders once more, Stephanie handed him the glass of water.

“Drink the whole glass,” she told him, watching every movement. “But slowly, okay?” And he nodded as he obeyed.

Nate, chewing on the corner of his mouth, glanced back towards the staircase Jonathan had come from a moment ago with the first-aid kit and cleared his throat. “I’ll, uh, I’ll go get a wet rag or something to clean him up with.” Then he scurried off before anyone could respond, Jonathan’s eyes following him down the hallway.

He and Steph swapped a nervous look, but Jonathan motioned for her to stay with Matt. He’d take point on the other brother.

Upstairs, he retraced his steps back to the master bedroom where the light in the bathroom was the only thing illuminated on the second floor. He could hear the water running and shallow, wheezing coughs, and picked up the pace a little. Inside, he saw Nate’s back as he bent over the sink and wrapped both arms around his chest, working his throat with whistling breaths and painful grunts.

As Jonathan pushed the door open wider, Nate flinched, catching Jonathan’s reflection behind him in the mirror. He was holding a rag soaked in cold water to his neck, and Jonathan frowned. “Let me see.”

Wordlessly, Nate turned to face him. Jonathan peeled the rag back from Nate’s throat and frowned deeper when Nate hissed in pain at even the lightest contact. Fingerprints, already purple and getting darker, dotted his collar and the sides of his neck, and Nate looked like he was working a little too hard for each breath. Nate didn’t meet his eyes, and Jonathan realized that he had never once tried to check his own partner for injuries, just helped haul Matt into the closest car while shouting about any possible broken bones or internal injuries - all Matt’s - and sped for home. Anger at himself bubbled, but Jonathan forced it back down and tugged Nate’s arm away from his chest, tenderly prodded at his swollen wrist while Nate gritted his teeth.

“You’ll need to wrap this,” he glanced up, trying to catch Nate’s gaze, “it might be sprained, but you’ll live.” When Nate still wouldn’t look at him, Jonathan returned his attention to the bruises on his neck. He took the rag from Nate’s hand, wet it again, rung it out, and started dabbing at the discolored parts of his skin to hopefully reduce the swelling. “What happened down there?”

Nate’s voice came out hoarse and strained. “I don’t know.” His good hand twisted at the hem of his shirt again. “But Afton’s dead, the kids are gone, and Matt’s back, so…” _So that’s all that matters_ , is what Nate meant, but he was wrong. It wasn’t all that mattered. Someone had beat his partner half to death, and Jonathan was just pissed he wasn’t there to take a swing at the monster.

Or had even noticed until now. How much pain had Nate been in on his lonely drive back home from the facility?

“How?” Jonathan asked instead, not bothering to mask his swirling emotions.

Nate shrugged and pushed the rag away from his throat. He stepped back, grabbed a few fresh towels from a rack by the shower, and turned like he was going to leave. But Jonathan caught his arm, careful not to pull too hard. The kid already looked like he might collapse at any moment. “Hey, let me look you over more thoroughly when he’s asleep, okay?”

But Nate just twisted his arm free and disappeared through the bedroom into the hallway, heading back downstairs. Jonathan turned back to the mirror and sighed, dropping the rag into the sink. He cupped his hands under the faucet and washed his face and hair. His own reflection looked pale and tired, but it was nothing compared to the faces of his friends. Resolution filled Jonathan’s chest, replacing the anger.

Nate wasn’t going to avoid him all night, that much he was sure of.

Downstairs, Stephanie was busy at work, dabbing ointment on Matt’s many open wounds, washing them, pulling out scraps of dirt and rope, dabbing rubbing alcohol on whatever might need it, and finally wrapping her husband’s arms up with thick, soft bandages. Jonathan had snagged Nate at some point, tightly and carefully wrapped the swollen wrist and surrounded it with ice, checked for how many goose eggs he had around his skull, happily decided that the swelling in his throat had gone down, and finally released him to tend to his own smaller cuts and scrapes on his hands from trying to pry the elevator door open. By the time he and Stephanie had both doted and doctored them half to death, both brothers were sullen and quiet.

“I should head out,” Jonathan muttered what felt like hours later, squatting next to Steph, who was still at Matt’s side.

Stephanie blinked up at him, caught staring at Matt's quiet face. It took her a minute to respond. “Hmm? Oh, you don’t have to. If Nate takes the air mattress, you could sleep on the couch or something…”

“As tempting as that is,” Jonathan raised his hands and smiled, “I think I’ll go crash at a motel. Get out of you guys’ hair.” Steph nodded absently and turned back to Matt, and Jonathan patted her shoulder. He went to gather his things from across the kitchen, and once he had it all together, he glanced back to the den where Steph, Matt, and Nate were all sitting, quiet and exhausted.

“Jonathan,” Steph called as he made his way to the front door, “you’re a lifesaver. Thank you.”

Tired as he was, Jonathan’s grin twinkled. “Call me if you need anything. That one there-” he pointed to where Nate had collapsed in an armchair an hour ago, “can get pretty cranky without his bedtime story.”

“Bully,” Nate muttered, swiping a hand over his face, and Steph flashed another smile at Jonathan.

“I will. Thank you. Don’t be a stranger.”

“Don’t think I’ll ever escape this crazy family, don’t worry,” Jonathan grinned, winked, and quietly shut the door behind himself.

“God,” Nate half yawned from somewhere behind her, “I thought he’d never leave.”

* * *

  
  


With Jonathan gone, it was much more of a team effort to get Matthew upstairs to his and Steph’s room and lower him down onto the bed, but they managed. Steph ducked past Nate, grabbed some pajamas from the dresser, and slipped into the bathroom to change. Matt sighed, leaning his head back into the pillows.

“Feel like I could sleep for a hundred years.”

Nate leaned against a nearby wall and rubbed at his bruised cheek. “Makes one of us,” he murmured under his breath. He didn’t notice the way that Matt’s eyes settled on him, watching him. Nate only moved aside as Steph brushed by with a fresh t-shirt for Matthew.

“Here, arms up so I can get your shirt off,” she started, but Matt pushed her aside.

He was glaring at Nate. “Now wait a minute... Nate, what - what are you even still doing here?”

Nate looked up, confusion slowly spreading across his features as he glanced around the room. “I - I thought that I was helping, but I can go…”

Steph’s gaze moved from her husband back to her brother-in-law, trying to figure out what she’d missed. “No, you don’t have to go anywhere, Nate.”

“Really?” Matt snapped, his eyes widening a tick. “Because I think he does.”

Nate felt the air knocked from his chest as surely as if he’d been thrown up against another wall. Stephanie gasped and gawked at her husband, unable to believe what she was hearing. “Um, Matthew, what are you talking about?”

His voice strained, Nate shook his head. “Steph-”

But Nate had learned by now that trying to divert Stephanie was like trying to catch a flash flood in a bucket - he was more likely to drown than do any good. She ignored him and turned on Matthew with enough fire in her eyes to make him flinch. Her small frame shook with fury, and something told Nate that it was Matthew’s condition alone that was sparing him from her full wrath. “No! Nate saved your life, Matthew, he risked his own to kill that evil shtriga thing and save you, how about a little appreciation?”

Matthew looked from her face to Nate’s, horror dawning in his expression. Nate straightened preemptively. “Shtriga… ? You told her? How could you tell her?” He couldn’t really shout, not with the way the insides of his throat were burning, but he didn’t need to. He never had with Nate. His calm was much more terrifying.

Nate swallowed, eyes searching the floor for answers that weren’t there. “I’m sorry - It seemed like the right thing to do at the time-”

“That’s not your call to make,” Matthew hissed between his teeth, leaning forward, curling his fingers in the bedspread.

Steph couldn’t believe any of it. “Matthew, enough!”

Matt ignored her, eyes still boring into Nate’s skull. “What _my_ wife knows about me, knows about your horrific family obsession, is my business! Not yours!” He sat back, his head shaking in disgust and dismay. “You probably told her that we went on hunting trips all the time, didn’t you? And made a sport out of it!”

That drew Nate’s eyes up from the floor, and he slashed one hand through the air as if to wipe away the thought altogether. “No, no! What the hell - I told her the truth!”

“The truth?” Matt laughed, sneering. He gestured towards Nate with his hand, knuckles still bruised from the fight. “The truth that it was _your_ fault Afton got away six years ago when we were _this close_ to ending him once and for all? That truth?”

Stephanie, stunned, blinked and looked from Matthew to Nate, who’d pressed himself as far into the corner of the room as he could at that point. His throat, cheeks, and ears were painted bright red with shame and anger. Nate curled his hands into fists as Matt continued.

“Or maybe the truth that you stood there, _watching_ as Afton devoured a child’s soul, and you did _nothing_!” Only Matthew knew the details of what happened when Nate was sixteen, the reasons that he’d called his brother and begged him to come help him, and having all those memories laid bare in front of Stephanie, having them shoved in his face by the person he trusted most in the world, Nate thought he was going to be sick.

But Matthew just wouldn’t stop. “No, you just watched, like the sociopathic freakshow your father and dear dead Mommy made you into.”

All colored drained from Nate’s face.

Stephanie stepped between them then, her eyes flooding the entirety of Matt’s field of vision. “Matthew! That is enough! This is _not_ the time, or the place! Nate just saved your _life_ , did you not hear me the first time? Your _life_ ! What is wrong with you?” Her voice dropped to a desperate whisper as she searched his eyes. “Where’s my husband that used to brag about his little brother who wore his heart on his sleeve and would do anything - _anything_ for someone else?”

Matt only turned his face away from her. “I never should’ve gotten involved in this again. I’d finally gotten out and-” He looked back at her, tilting his head to the side as his gaze shifted from her to Nate again. “Then again, hindsight is twenty/twenty.”

Steph pressed the tips of her fingers to her temples, taking a few steps away from Matthew. “I - I don’t know what to say…” Watching Matt squirm under her gaze, Stephanie wasn’t even sure who she was looking at anymore. “Who are you, and what have you done with the man I fell in love with?” At least he had the decency to blush at that, to look away from her again.

Nate peeled himself off the wall and, keeping a fair distance from the bed, walked to stand at Stephanie’s side, gently touching her arm. “Hey, Cordy, it’s alright.”

Looking up at him, she all but stamped her foot in defiance. “No, it’s not.”

He turned her towards him and kept his voice low, measured. “It is. Just - Get some rest, okay? I should head out anyway.” Nate felt dizzy as she looked up at him, stunned and a little heartbroken. “It’s fine, I promise. Get some rest, both of you.” He wrapped her in a hug, squeezing her tight.

“Hey, Nate.”

He turned his head to see that Matthew had gotten out of bed and was standing, glaring at him with what could only be described as hatred. “Don’t touch my wife.”

Stephanie rolled her eyes and wiped away the last of the tears on her cheeks as Nate recoiled from her. Gritting his teeth so tight he thought his jaw might shatter, he dropped his head and fled the room. The door slammed behind him.

Steph chased after him. “Nate!”

Matthew followed them out onto the landing, looking down on the den, watching Nate grab his bag and his guitar case, wordlessly shrugging on his jacket with a grimace. Stephanie kept trying to grab his arm, get in front of him, something to make him listen to her. But Nate kept his eyes above her head and bolted for the door, as Matt shouted down after him, “And don’t you _ever_ come back!”

His hand on the doorknob, Nate paused, took a sharp breath, and disappeared through the front door without so much as looking back. Stephanie peered through the living room window, helpless as she watched the Firebird rocket down their street, swerve around the corner, and disappear. She covered her face with her hands and sunk down onto the couch. Then slowly, taking her fingers away from her eyes, she glared up at Matthew, still standing on the landing looking down.

She rose from the couch, stalked up the stairs, and shoved him aside when he tried to stop her. “Don’t speak to me.” She passed the door to the master bedroom and instead turned to go into the spare office.

Matt’s flat expression never changed as the door slammed shut behind her. He smoothly stepped down the hall, and he could hear her sobbing through the walls as he waited outside for a moment. Then, reaching out, he locked the door and turned away.


	7. Up in Smoke

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Glad you finally made it :)

Los Angeles, California  
March, 2011

Tearing down the highway once he got out of the suburbs, Nate punched the radio and turned up the music as loud as it would go. Not for the sound but the escape. There was nothing better for drowning out pain and rebuilding walls than listening to Green Day so loud it rattled his eyeballs in his skull. With the desert opening up before him and nothing around for miles, Nate pressed down on the gas, not caring if a cop tried to pull him over, not caring if he ran his car to pieces, not caring if he wrapped it around a telephone pole with himself still inside.

He just needed to get as far away from that house as quickly as possible.

Until a little girl appeared in his headlights.

Nate swerved, only just managing not to flip the old Firebird, skipping it like a stone over the sand until it ground to halt. He felt like a pile of Jell-O and nerve-endings as he panted, trying to get his heart to stop hammering so hard in his chest. Cutting the radio, he turned in his seat to see Charlie still watching him from the road.

When it felt like his knees wouldn’t give out underneath him, Nate got out of the car and stumbled over to her. “Charlie?” She was sobbing, screaming, covering her ears with her little hands, and Nate dropped to his knees in front of her. “What are you doing here? I thought-”

Suddenly she grabbed Nate’s shoulders with cold hands, more real and solid than he had ever seen her before, and she tried to push at his chest, shove him backwards. When he didn’t move, she took his hands in an attempt to pull him to his feet, pointing desperately back in the direction that he’d come.

Nate was still trying to wrap his mind around her being there at all. He thought she’d moved on, thought she was free now. “Hey, hey! What- What’s going on? Charlie!” His voice cracked, and Charlotte pulled away from him. She kept staring back down the highway until suddenly she screamed and burst into flames.

Thrown to the ground by the force of her sudden departure, Nate caught his breath and looked up. Slowly, he put the pieces together and felt his heart drop like a stone into the pit of his stomach. “Oh God…”

* * *

Nate could see the plumes of smoke before he even turned into the neighborhood. Sirens blared in the distance as the Firebird jumped the curb in front of the Patrick’s house and skidded to a halt. Nate half-jumped, half-fell out of the car, staggered around the hood, and looked up in horror as flames blazed from the windows of the second floor.

“Oh God, oh God, no.” He scanned the street for them, the lawns of nearby houses that were quickly filling up with neighbors. “Matthew! Stephanie!” Realizing that they might still be inside, Nate bolted for the front door only to nearly trip over his own feet as he realized that a figure stood in the middle of the path to the door, silhouetted by the flames.

It was Matthew, standing with his bandaged hands resting calmly at his sides, and he watched the flames with a blank expression on his face.

“Matt? Matt!” Nate rushed to his side, took his shoulders, and tried to shake some sense into him. But Matthew, his Matt, his big brother, was not home. Someone else was staring out at him. And suddenly everything - from their fight before Nate stormed out, to the way Charlotte appeared to him on the road - snapped together in crystal clear technicolor. “Oh crap, oh crap, oh crap…”

Leaving Matt where he was, Nate pulled the collar of his shirt up over his nose, kicked the front door in, and charged inside.

The first floor was hardly touched, and it was apparent that the fire had started upstairs. Nate scanned the den, trying to find any hint of movement through the smoke. Terror beat like a bass drum deep in his chest.

“Stephanie!” With no reply above the roar of the flames above his head, Nate raced to the stairs and gathered his courage before taking them two at a time all the way up to the second floor where the walls were ablaze. Heat seared his cheeks and his hands, and he coughed as the smoke reached his lungs through the thin fabric of his shirt.

Eyes darting through the hall, he went to check the master bedroom first. Flames ate across the bed, up the curtains hanging in the window, shattering the big mirrors in the bathroom. He checked every corner, even the closet. “Stephanie! Steph, can you hear me?” But she wasn’t inside, not in this room. He frowned, doubling back into the hallway. “Stephanie!”

Tears filled up his vision from the smoke, and every sharp, panicked inhale was a knife in his lungs. He felt like he needed to stop and catch his breath, but the longer he stood there, the more Steph’s chances slipped away. He had to find her, he had to.

Then he could hear pounding on the door just down the hall and screaming, shrill and terrified, through the flames. He grabbed a quilt from a basket in the master bedroom, draped it over himself, and charged deep down the hall towards the noise, where the fire was at its worst.

Drawing closer, he could see Charlotte standing in front of the door to the office. She was the one pounding on the door, screaming and sobbing and pointing for Nate to go inside. He leaned in, pressing his ear to the door. “Steph? Steph, it’s Nate! Are you in there? Please, say something!”

Nothing, not even the smallest sound from the other side of the door.

He looked at Charlotte again, but he could see in her eyes that this was it. This had to be it. So he drew back, raised one foot, and kicked the door in. Heat and flames rolled over him through the now-opened doorway, and Nate ducked inside, keeping his head low as the room filled with smoke.

“Steph-” he choked her name, barely able to gasp for enough air to shout for her now. The heat itself was bearing down on him, drawing every last ounce of strength as he floundered in the darkness. Nate crawled along the floor, sweeping his arms back and forth. He could hear noises in the walls and the ceiling above his head, groaning and creaking that sounded like the house was getting ready to give way.

Nate wondered if Charlotte could’ve been wrong somehow, if she was confused and led him there by mistake. If she had, he didn’t know if he would have the chance to check anywhere else. Nate already couldn’t breathe, could barely keep his eyes open. He was moments away from giving up when he felt the soft fabric of a shirt, felt long hair, shaking shoulders. It was Stephanie.

Huddled in the corner, just barely conscious, but alive.

“Ste-” was all he could manage before a coughing fit sent him shaking on his hands and knees.

The moment he’d regained any control at all, Nate scooped her up into his arms, careful to pull the quilt over her so the falling cinders wouldn’t burn her, and he staggered as fast he could back towards the door to the office. His shoulder hit the door frame hard, and he had to work on memory alone among the roiling smoke and flames. Tripping and banging into everything along the way, Nate finally found the staircase and leaned both his and Steph’s weight against the wall as he followed it down.

Head swimming from lack of oxygen, eyes burning from the smoke, he could barely see the morning light streaming in through that one opening in this hell on Earth. His sprained wrist sparked with pain as Stephanie shifted in his arms, and he nearly dropped her there, only a few feet from the door. But he managed to hold on, to stumble along, almost there.

Just when he thought he couldn’t take one step further, they tumbled out into the open air, onto the grass of the front lawn, Nate pitching himself sideways so he didn’t crush her.

Gasping for breath, Stephanie pulled at chunks of grass as her lungs tried to expel all the toxins from the smoke. The muscles of her neck and back spasming as she coughed, Steph felt the shock ringing through her bones - the realization that she wasn’t going to die, she wasn’t going to die. Thank God.

As the hacking slowly began to subside, she glanced up to see Matthew standing over her, his face a mask of fire and ice. Something in her chest, beyond the aching lungs and pounding heart, rended itself in half. That wasn’t her husband looking down at her. She wasn’t sure what Nate dragged out of that basement, but it wasn’t only Matthew. Someone else was there, too.

She tried to push herself to her feet, to grab this imposter and shake him and demand that he give Matt back to her, but Nate beat her to it. He pushed himself up, slammed his fist into Matthew’s jaw, and sent them both tumbling back onto the ground. Nate clutched his sore wrist with a gasp of pain that triggered another spasm of violent coughing.

Stephanie finally got her hands and knees underneath her. “No- stop!” she croaked, desperate to pull them apart before either one of them killed the other.

But neither of them were listening now. Nate got to his knees, dragging Matt closer and punching him again and again until Nate started hacking like it might actually kill him. As tears ran streaks down Nate’s soot covered face, a black trail of ectoplasm began to drip from Matt’s nose, and he reached up a hand to brush it away, a smirk on his cracked lips as he sat up.

Nate shook with every cough, glowering up into Matthew’s eyes. “Get your filthy, slimy goo out of my brother, you monster.” But Matt only grinned, still full of that same smug glee from the storage center, and Nate felt shivers run over his scorched skin. There was little he could do to fight back at this point, anything he did would just injure Matt further, and he was already half-dead, despite his wide smile. “What are you looking at?”

Besides, he doubted he had the strength to try.

“Interesting,” Matt said, tilting his head to regard Nate. “You have just as much fight as your mother did before I killed her, too.” Then he was at Nate’s throat again, pressing him down into the grass with both hands wrapped tight around his throat. “I’ll admit, it took a lot more to break you than I thought it would!”

Nate’s eyes rolled wildly inside his head as he thrashed for a moment, but soon there wasn’t an ounce of fight left in him. He couldn’t keep doing this, couldn’t keep losing his brother over and over again. He just wanted it to stop.

“This is much more fun than using that silly butter knife,” Matthew cooed above him. “Much more personal this way.”

Stephanie was crawling towards them across the lawn. “Matthew, I know you’re still there! Stop, he’s your brother!”

“Oh, don’t worry dear,” he called towards her, his gleaming eyes still fixed on Nate’s face, “it’ll be your turn soon enough!” But when Matthew did look up at Stephanie, Charlotte stood in his line of sight instead. And she wasn’t crying now.

She was pissed.

Her eyes hollowed out, skin clotting off in chunks and strips of flesh. She was drenched from head to toe in blood. The confident smirk fell from Matthew’s lips as she charged at him, flying across the grass, swiping right through Matt’s chest and tearing Afton through with her. The sky above darkened with storm clouds as the two spirits twisted and fought in the air above the Patrick’s house, still burning and casting horrible shadows over the surrounding faces of onlookers, transfixed and terrified.

They saw only a lightning storm, a sudden crash of bright light and sound and fury, but Nate - as his eyes slipped open again, breath returning to his lungs - Nate could see Charlotte grab Afton by his collar and drag his face closer and closer to hers, her voice hissing through the rain, “ _It’s me…_ ” The whole world seemed to pause in that moment as Nate pushed himself up onto his knees, watching Charlie’s words bore deep into Afton’s skull.

“ _The one you should not have killed._ ”

The two spirits lit the sky ablaze. Lightning hit the ground, blowing out every light on the street. Cars rocked in the wave of sound and heat, alarms blared, and the fire seemed squelched by the rush from the explosion.

It was finally over.

Matt looked around in confusion, and Nate let his head drop forward, his hands hitting the dirt, then his elbows, then his cheek. His fingers curled helplessly in the grass as he wheezed for air. His vision went in and out of focus and blinking the tears away did nothing to help.

“Mouth-breather,” he gasped, totally spent.

“Matthew? Nate?” Stephanie’s tear-filled, smoke-scorched voice drifted over them, and seeing Nate limp in the grass, she crawled the last few feet over to them, brushing his hair back from his face and checking to see if he was even still breathing. “Oh my God, Nathan?”

He managed to reach out blindly and find her hand, giving it a weak squeeze, and Stephanie sobbed in relief.

The moment that Matthew seemed to realize where he was, the moment he saw his wife curled over the body of his brother, he scrambled back from them until his back hit the front of the Firebird.

Stephanie looked up, seeing the fear in his eyes. “Matthew?”

The more he looked, the more he began to hyperventilate - the house, Steph’s weary eyes, Nate’s shallow breathing. It had all felt like a nightmare while it was happening, a sick, twisted, awful nightmare, but somehow, waking up made it so much worse. “Oh God… oh God, oh God, I-I…”

He’d done this. He had done this.

“Hey, hey!” Stephanie dragged herself over to him, cupped his face in her hands, pulled his eyes away from the flames, back to her. “It’s going to be okay.” She wrapped her hands around the back of his neck, drawing him closer, closer still until they were wrapped tight in each other’s arms. Matthew rocked them both, unravelling under her hands as she tried to smooth away the tears.

Nate watched them both as the sirens grew closer, as the lights of the trucks flashed over them. He let his eyes close, too exhausted to keep them open a moment more.


	8. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Neither of us can believe that it's already time for the final chapter of the pilot! I couldn't imagine how far this idea would come when I first joked to Becca about the Winchester boys reminding me of Matt and Nate. But the more we talked about it, the more we realized that it would be an awesome story to tell, and now here we are!
> 
> We'll be hosting an Ask-Me-Anything all weekend (starting tomorrow/Saturday), most likely on our blog @devil-may-care-series, so go ahead and start sending in your questions (non-spoilery, of course). We can't wait to gab about our boys, the writing process, some of the plans that we have, whatever you guys want to know! We've even got some other surprises in store to celebrate, so be sure the follow the blog.
> 
> We also can't thank you enough for being here and going absolutely NUTS over this project. Neither of us could have anticipated this turn out and enthusiasm behind a silly little story (that isn't very silly or little anymore). So thank you all for your theories, comments, kudos, questions, and follows. They all mean the world to us.
> 
> That said, enjoy the epilogue!
> 
> -Reverse, Becca

Los Angeles, California  
March, 2011  
A few days later...

The man in the coffee-stained tracksuit sat with his feet propped up on the front desk of the Brightside Motel. The bell above the door rang wildly, calling his attention with a well-rehearsed, and completely detached, “You want two queens or a king?” But the thing that sent a shiver down his spine was the voice that replied.

“I’ll take your bridal suite and the usual, my good man!” Nathan slapped the bell on the desk, a wily grin on his face as he leaned his chin into his hand. Both he and the young couple walking in behind him were covered in bruises, cuts, and burns, and they all wore clothes that smelled like smoke.

In other words, they looked like they’d been through hell, but that didn’t get them a discount, no matter how much Nate tried to con his way into one.

Five minutes later, he carried his guitar case and duffel bag back to the familiar old room twenty-one. At least Tracksuit Guy had bothered to have it cleaned between stays - not like Nate thought anyone else had been in the room since he left. The Brightside motel was no tourist destination, after all.

He dropped onto the bed nearest the door with a groan and let the silence surround him like a blanket. It was over - at least for the moment. Maybe tomorrow would bring a fresh plate of horrors along with his eggs sunny side up and four slices of bacon (in fact, it most definitely would, considering Nate’s track record), but for now, for right now at least, he could breathe. And that was no small feat according to the pretty nurse who had shoved an oxygen mask onto his face at the hospital.

Still, something itched in the back of his head, burned in the pit of his stomach, and he sat up, his back unnaturally straight, and stared into the corner. But it was empty aside from a particularly oddly shaped floor lamp that cast strange shadows over the room. Nate sighed and tapped the tips of his fingers together between his knees. That was a problem for future Nate. Present Nate wanted a shower to wash off the lingering scents of antiseptic and smoke.

Then a knock came at the door, and a quiet but hopeful, “Nate?”

“I’m naked!”

Stephanie opened the door anyway as he coughed, still thick and painful, and was met with an indignant gasp. “Oh, don’t pretend.” She slapped his shoulder and sank down onto the bed beside him. Steph’s voice was still hoarse even after treatment. Of course, she’d been in the house the longest, so speaking above a whisper still sent her into a coughing fit. If Nate could lift his arms above his chest without groaning, he might have hugged her, she looked so pitiful.

Glancing around, Steph couldn’t help but snort at his choice of room. “Reminds me of old times.”

“Hey.” Nate poked her shoulder. “ _Mi casa es su casa._ ”

“ _Esta no es una casa_ ,” Stephanie answered back good-naturedly, but she could see that Nate was spending much too long trying to figure out what she’d said. So, she waved it off. “Never mind.” Then, with a note of confusion, she asked something that had been on her mind for a while, something that wasn’t about the end of life as she knew it, “Hey, um, how did you know my maiden name was Cordato?”

Nate’s eyes were closed by then, head hanging low and heavy, his eyelids still red from the smoke and purple from the bruises, a color scheme he wore often all across his face. “Hm?”

“You called me Cordy earlier, short for Cordato, and only my friends call me Cordy.” Steph tried to catch that dark gaze, but as always, it was somewhere other than in the room with her.

“Would it bother you if I said that I snooped through your house when you weren’t looking and found an old award you got in college so I could do a background check on you?” He blinked at her, and she blinked back, not sure whether or not to think he was lying. Finally, he broke into a smile and shook his head. “I didn’t. I just… I happened to see it on your mail when I came in that first night… it’s - my old man kinda taught me to look out for stuff like that.” His head bobbed like the movement itself was keeping him awake. “Force of habit.”

Stephanie put a hand on his arm, and finally she succeeded in catching his gaze. She couldn’t begin to thank him, for saving Matt, for saving her. She’d only known him a few days and already he’d walked into a fire for her. “Matthew told me about your relationship with your dad, how you’ve never had much of a home because of him. I know right now, we don’t have much to offer, but…”

Someone pounded loudly on the door then, startling the two occupants, and Nate stood, still stiff and a little lop-sided, and looked through the peephole before he opened the door.

On the other side stood Jonathan, arms filled with bags and an easy smirk cocked on his face.

“‘Sup, snotwad,” he said with a nod, easily pushing past Nate and into the room. Once inside, he spotted Stephanie, who frowned playfully up at him, and his grin widened. “Oh, I’m sorry, snotwad _s_.”

“Hey, Jonathan,” Steph croaked, standing from the bed as Jonathan dumped his haul onto it, giving him a quick hug when his arms were free. “What is all this?”

Without turning, Jonathan slapped at Nate, who had snuck behind him and poked curiously at one bag. “I bring gifts,” he beamed, the brightness in his eyes masking aching guilt, presenting some large paper bags to Steph. “Something for the lady, something for the happy couple, and-” he threw a jar of peanut butter at Nate’s head, “other various necessities.”

“Clean clothes!” Stephanie squealed, pulling an off-brand t-shirt from the bag Jonathan had given her, much better than the half-charred one she was currently wearing. There were so many more items in the bags, and not just shirts - everything they would need for at least a week. She peered into the plastic bags next. “Are those-?”

“Enough groceries to choke a _Hungry Hungry Hippo_? Yes.” Jonathan pulled a box of new silverware from the hoard, shoving a spoon in Nate’s face so he could stab through the frustrating paper seal. "And toiletries, too, because I know the hospital didn't give you squat."

Steph beamed at the dark-haired hunter. “How - where did you get all this?”

Jonathan shrugged, trying and failing not to look too proud of himself. “Oh, the shopping mall on the other side of town said I could take them.”

Nate looked up then, mouth filled with sticky peanutty goodness. “Dey did?”

“Well, come to think of it, I didn’t really ask.” Jonathan winked. “Oh well.”

Nate raised his eyebrows, silently impressed, and shoved more peanut butter in his mouth.

Shaking her head, Steph stood on her toes and hugged Jonathan one more time before scooping up the rest of the bags. “Thank you, Jonathan, really.”

He shoved his hands in his jeans pockets, wishing the sinking feeling in his gut would go away. “Hey, just tell the man of the hour to come thank me himself so I can, you know, properly meet him.”

Stephanie, who had spun towards the door, paused, a shadow passing quickly over her face. “I will,” she smiled, a little too forced, “but he’ll probably be sleeping all this off for awhile. But if you stick around, I’ll see what I can do.”

Jonathan smiled, kind and understanding as always. “Sure thing.”

Pulling open the door - which Nate caught for her - Steph slipped outside, and was gone. Nate closed the door and Jonathan, sighing loudly, snagged a can of ravioli from the stash and pulled the lid off, feasting on the cold contents. Nate sat next to him, licking up peanut butter.

Between bites, as he and Nate enjoyed their respective meals, Jonathan cleared his throat. “So, ah, what the hell actually happened back there?”

Nate swallowed the peanut butter in his mouth and glared unhappily into the jar. “Frankly? No idea.” He explained what he could - his and Matt’s fight, Charlie appearing on the road, finding the house in flames, waking up in the hospital and almost throttling the closest nurse before Steph found him and calmed him back to sleep. Not to mention what had happened in the basement. None of it made any sense. “I can’t begin to imagine what Afton did to Matt or what parts of that monster are still slithering around in his head. Maybe Afton’s gone for good, maybe not. With our luck...”

Jonathan nodded, scraping at the sides of the can. “What did you tell the doctors? Heck - what did you tell the _police_?”

Wincing, Nate speared his spoon into the peanut butter and rubbed at his forehead. Of course everyone had questions. How did the house catch fire? How did Matt make it out with Steph still locked inside? What happened to Matt in the first place? He’d been so dehydrated and beat up and scarred… Nate’s stomach twisted again, and as hard as it was to breathe already, it got worse the more he thought about it.

“Told them the truth,” Nate muttered under his breath. “Someone broke in, beat Matt to hell, and set fire to the house with Steph locked inside. Probably some psycho. I showed up after the house was already on fire, got Stephanie out, and had to fight Matt because he was in shock and didn’t realize I was just trying to help.”

“You think they’ll buy that?” Jonathan asked, his voice only barely above a whisper.

“They won’t be able to prove anything else.”

They both went back to eating.

Jonathan kept stealing glances out of the corner of his eye at Nate, though, still trying to gauge where his head was at. Finally, Nate caught him in the act. “I’m fine. I’m not the one who had a shtriga sucking on me for a week.”

“No, but having to fight your own brother after finding him like that?” Jonathan raised his hands defensively at the positively lethal levels of “back off” coming from Nate’s dark eyes, and instead, he asked, “You’re staying with them, aren’t you?”

Nate let the peanut butter drop between his knees and dropped his shoulders, gathering his thoughts, as if he hadn’t already made up his mind. He shrugged, and glanced at Jonathan, briefly meeting his eyes. “They’re family.”

Jonathan shrugged and muttered around a mouthful of cheap pasta, “Hasn’t stopped you from ditching the scene before.”

“That was different.” Nate leaned his arms onto his knees, letting his hair hang over his eyes like a mask, rolling the plastic jar between his hands. He couldn’t see the pleased smile on his friend’s face. “Jonathan?”

“Yeah?”

“Thanks.”

“Hey,” Jonathan pointed the spoon at him, “don’t ever say I didn’t do anything nice for you.”

Nate looked abashed. “I never said that!”

“Well, you never _didn’t_ say it, and that’s just as bad.”

“Whatever.” Nate rolled his eyes with a smirk, staring down into the jar again. “And… good luck. I mean it.”

“With what?” Jonathan laughed and tossed himself dramatically closer to the headrest of the second bed. “Getting your ugly butt out of bed in the morning? Please, I’ve managed in the past.”

Nate’s head snapped up. “But- I thought you’d be heading out with the band?”

“What band? You really expect me to put up with those two chuckleheads?” Jonathan rolled his eyes and kicked his shoes off, tossing them onto the floor in a way that would particularly bug his host. “Nah, you’re still my partner, extra crispy or not, and still the most entertaining thing in a hundred miles.”

Nate huffed, amused, and glanced around the room. His dark eyes subconsciously searched the corners for corpses that were no longer there, unaware of Jonathan’s gaze on him. In his search, however, he spotted a plastic bag with a carton of ice cream in it.

“Dude,” he jumped up as quickly as his aching muscles would allow, and swept up the bag, “you going to just let this melt?”

“Oh,” Jonathan frowned, “forgot that was in there. It’s for Matt, or whoever, in case solids are too much.”

“Well, we don’t have a fridge, genius,” Nate muttered, heading to the door. “Guess it’s his now.”

He slipped outside and closed the door on Jonathan’s mischievous smirk.

Outside, Nate blinked into the harsh sun and heat, jumping when another figure, dark and tall, appeared before him.

“Oh, Nate,” Matt yelped, Nate backing up a step. “Sorry,” the blonde smirked awkwardly, “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

An unspoken, “It’s a little too late for that,” passed over Nate’s face before he wordlessly held out the bag. “Jonathan got groceries,” he muttered eventually when Matt didn’t take it, “guess this is yours since we don’t have a fridge.”

Matt looked disappointed, but forced a little bit of a smile.

“Thanks,” he took the bag with shaking hands, Nate catching a glimpse of fresh gauze wrapped around raw skin. Ducking his head in something like a nod, Nate turned back to his room, but didn’t go inside. Matt, shivering even in the heat, slowly turned back to his own room as well.

They hadn’t spoken at the hospital. Of course, with Nate barely able to breathe, Matt worried about Stephanie, and his own treatments, they’d really only had time to corroborate their stories, and that only consisted of Nate writing down what he intended to tell the police and handing it to Matt before leaving again. But they couldn’t go on avoiding each other or they’d risk losing another six years.

Nate screwed his eyes shut and let out a breath that rattled its way through him.

“Matt!”

His voice alone echoing through the parking lot made his older brother freeze, slowly turning back to him, the fake cheer in his eyes making Nate flinch.

“Yeah?”

Suddenly words started spilling out of Nate’s chest before they had necessarily made a pass through his brain, and he couldn’t hold them back, couldn’t make them stop, “I know you must be pissed at me for not hearing you out at the bar. I get it, I should’ve listened to you, and if I had, maybe none of this would’ve happened. But I had to be the stupid, angsty little brother like I always am, and it - it got you tortured by a shtriga. And you were _right_ , if it weren’t for me, Afton would’ve been dead six years ago, and you could’ve been normal and happy and - and everything I told Steph, I told her because I was scared to death of losing you again. I never meant to-”

“You honestly think I’m mad at you?” Matthew’s voice was still raw from a week of screaming with no one to hear him and days of answering the same questions too many times. His eyes were even redder than Nate’s, sunken into his skull. He looked like one strong breeze would knock him over, but in weather like this, Nate’s words alone might have done the trick. “Nate, I almost killed you.” The last two words were strangled, tangled up in his throat. “I locked my wife in our house and set it on _fire_.”

“Hey! That wasn’t you!” Nate felt his stomach twist when Matt winced, so he made an effort to lower his volume. “That was Afton, man, whatever messed up things he did to you-”

“I left you behind!”

That declaration did give Nate pause, stunned speechless as Matt turned away from him and leaned wearily on the wall behind him. Six years they’d been apart, and neither of them was sure who to blame, if anyone. When Matt looked back up at his brother, his eyes were rimmed with tears, and it choked Nate more than any hands or vivid bruises ever could.

Those eyes were no one’s but Matthew’s.

“I left you behind,” Matt spoke slowly, mostly to himself than his brother, “right after the moment I swore to stay by your side, the time you needed me most. You needed me and I - I thought college was more important.” He laughed at himself, pressing the heels of his hands into his eyes. “I - I’m sorry. I know it doesn’t mean anything, but I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Nate.”

Awkward and at a loss for words, Nate inched closer, his hands twitching uselessly at his sides, so he rubbed at the brace around his wrist.

“Don’t be. You made a life,” Nate shrugged, Matt staring at him. “Look, I get it! You never wanted to be part of this - the hunting, the monsters - and you had the chance to get out. You went to college, you got a wife, you put yourself together. I mean, sure, I waited for you, but… hey, I was a walking, talking haunted house, not to mention a brat. The past week though,” he glanced behind Matt at his room, as if he could see Stephanie inside, “kinda… I get it, man. Don’t beat yourself up about it.”

Matt shook his head and furiously scrubbed at his eyes. He huffed once, unable to comprehend what he had just heard, and stared at Nate again. Nate squirmed even more so.

“Why don’t you hate me?”

Matt breathed around the pain in his chest, and Nate blew out of his lips, leaning on the wall next to him, their shoulders almost touching.

“Thought I did. Guess I don’t, though.” Nate didn’t look at him, just kept fiddling with his hands, twisting the bracelet. “You want me to hate you?”

Dark eyes finally met his own, and Matt studied them long and hard. Slowly, a smile split his face. Nate frowned. “What?”

“Nothing, I just… I missed you.”

Nate grinned. “I’d miss me too.”

Tossing his head back, Matt howled with laughter, clapping the empty hand on his knee as his whole body shook. Nate stared at him, a startled and mischievous twinkle in his eye, but mostly an old fondness he hadn’t felt in a lifetime. Matt’s laughter was like the glue seeping into cracks so old, Nate hadn’t even known they had been there.

Finally, the fit passed, and Matt wiped his eyes again, struggling to regain his breath. They both watched the open desert that stretched before them in all directions, minds racing. The first one to break the silence was Matt, and it was barely a whisper.

“What if I do it again?”

Nate blinked at him cluelessly. “Do what? Go back to college?”

“No,” though Matt did smirk a little at the thought for a fleeting moment. “I mean, what if I lose control? What if I try to hurt someone again?”

Matt looked up to him, but Nate looked away. “It won’t happen again.”

Pushing off the wall, Matt faced Nate, almost pleading with him. “But how do you _know_ it won’t?”

“Because I won’t let it.”

The response was so automatic, so easy, Matt could only blink in response.

“Listen man,” Nate shrugged as if it was the most logical thing in the world, “you’re a pain in the butt, you sing show tunes all the time, and your voice is annoying, but… I guess we’re stuck with each other, right?”

“I -” Matt fumbled slightly for his words, “I thought you would be heading back on the road.”

Nate almost laughed at that. “Why? I don’t have a band anymore. I just killed the thing I’ve been raised my entire life to kill. Besides, you’re kind of the only family I’ve got.”

“What about John?”

Nate scoffed, and Matt nodded, figuring that was a fair response. He certainly wouldn’t want to be around his step-father for a single moment longer than he needed to be. And Nate had already done that for nine years by the time Matt had even met the man.

Not to mention some portion of the last six that they still hadn’t talked about.

“That is,” Nate shifted, eyes dropping to his shoes, “if you think you can find room for this awkward third wheel.”

Matt smiled at him, feeling like he might actually be glowing inside. He called loudly, “Stephanie? Can we keep him?”

“Big yes!” Stephanie called from inside the motel room where she had her ear pressed to the door, “Glad you boys decided to be reasonable!” And Nate’s head swiveled to stare at the closed door before turning back to Matt, both shocked and insulted. Matt just grinned.

“Well,” Nate laughed, “that was a lot easier than my plan to start a cult of raccoons in your attic and slowly steal all your food until you let me live with you.”

Matt laughed again, squeezing his middle and groaning. Nate patted his shoulder a couple times, and when Matt straightened up again, he took a couple big breaths, leaning his head against the ugly vinyl siding behind him.

As they fell into a comfortable silence, Matt’s mind began to wander again. He felt a distant chill send shivers through him, the cold and dampness of that basement creeping back in over his skin. Almost imperceptibly, Nate inched closer, their shoulders brushing together, and the chill vanished. Matt glanced at him. He hadn’t noticed before, but they were the same height now.

It wasn’t fair, the burden his kid brother had faced his whole life. It wasn’t fair to put this on his shoulders as well.

But the truly ironic part was that there was no one more capable of carrying it.

Something hot and fiery grew in Matt’s belly, and the brothers looked up at each other.

“I’d say, since there’s so much we don’t know - what Afton really was, what he did to me, _how_ he did it, if it could happen again - that if we are going to figure this thing out…” Matt smiled, holding one fist between them, the one with knuckles still bruised from his little brother’s face, “We’ve got work to do.”

Dimples deepening, knuckles busted, and eyes shining, Nate bumped Matt’s fist with his own.


End file.
